Complicated

by Kristen Ashley

  She nodded, moved, waved to Reva and walked out.

  Hix turned to the half door and saw Reva in the door to dispatch.

  “That pompous ass messes things up for you and the Calloway family, Hixon, you’ll have another shooting on your hands,” Reva announced.

  Reva was a petite, very round, older version of Ida but with short, dyed-brown hair teased into a helmet style that oddly suited her.

  However, whereas Ida was a sage who was relatively mellow, regardless that her family might or might not be significantly dysfunctional, Reva had the wisdom of her years and was a ball-buster, which might be the reason why her son was a heart surgeon in Omaha and her daughter flew jets for the Air Force.

  “It’ll be all right,” he told her.

  “It better be,” she shot back, turned and flounced to her desk.

  Hix went through the swinging door and right to his office, relieved to see Blatt at least had it in him not to be sitting in Hix’s chair.

  He was standing, staring at the whiteboard, and the second Hix hit the room, Blatt turned to him, clapped his hands, rubbed them together and asked, “Right, run it down for me.”

  “Henry—”

  Blatt lifted a hand his way. “Don’t give me that. This is serious. You need all the help you can get.”

  “We got it covered.”

  Blatt’s eyes narrowed. “I’ll repeat, don’t give me that shit, boy.”

  Hix let his deputies call him by his first name and he’d never, maybe even with a gun to his head, though he hoped that was never tested, refer to one of them as “boy,” “son,” “girl,” or “gal.”

  Until he’d retired, Hix had never called Blatt “Henry,” but Hix had been called “boy” almost exclusively, unless Blatt was feeling soft-hearted, then he’d call Hix “son.”

  Hix hated it.

  But right then, the priority was stopping a retired sheriff who’d never investigated a murder in his entire career interfering with a murder investigation. It was not telling the man how he felt about being forty-two, the elected sheriff and being called “boy.”

  “Due respect, Henry, I understand you wanna help but the best way you can help is let us get on with this case.”

  “I know every inch of this county and practically every soul in it.”

  The first was true. The second, even with a county that unpopulated, it was still large in land mass, so it couldn’t even come close to being true.

  “You happen onto a five-year-old, white, Ford F150 with McCook County plates that shouldn’t be anywhere but the Grady ranch or a house on Emerson, not much you can do,” Hix told him.

  “You run it down for me, maybe I’d have other ideas,” Blatt returned.

  “Henry, I got some calls to make and then I gotta get out there and see if I can make some leeway in finding out who killed the father of two little kids. Again, respect, but I don’t have time for this.”

  “I’m here to help.”

  “And I’m tellin’ you, best way you can do that is let me get on with doing my job.”

  Blatt gave him a scowl. “That isn’t respect.”

  “And just to point out,” he tossed out his hand to indicate the both of them in that room having that conversation, “this isn’t respect.”

  Blatt blew out a breath, broke eye contact, lifted a hand to squeeze the back of his neck, dropped it, then looked again to Hix.

  “Faith is my wife’s sister’s great-niece. My sister-in-law is married to Faith’s great-uncle.”

  Damn.

  It was true that Blatt was a blowhard, but outside of liking a bit too much his position of authority, he’d always given indication he was also about serving his citizens.

  He just did it in a pompous-assed way.

  “Then how you can help is keep an eye out for Nat’s truck and look after Faith. She’s gonna have a lotta people in her space thinkin’ they’re helping when they’re probably not. If you can shield her so she can get on with her grief without playing hostess to half the town, you’ll be doin’ a lot.”

  Blatt didn’t look like he liked it, but he did look like he was considering it, then he came to a decision.

  “Yeah. Maybe I’ll spend the day on Faith’s porch. Make sure she’s got quiet to take a nap or somethin’.”

  Hix bit back a sigh of relief.

  “I’m sure she’d be grateful.”

  Blatt nodded.

  Hix got out of his way when Blatt started toward the door.

  The man stopped when he was in line with him.

  “Find this fucker, son,” he ordered, fire in his eyes, wearing his sixty-eight years on his face.

  He knew Faith and he cared for her.

  He also knew Nat and he wanted the man who ended his life to pay for it.

  “We’re throwin’ everything we got at that, Henry.”

  Blatt nodded, drew in a big breath and walked out Hix’s door.

  Hix was back at his desk, making his last calls, approving the notice Terra sent to him after he’d emailed her the details on Calloway’s truck, fielding other calls from papers in the county, when his cell on the desk beeped again.

  He looked to it and it was another text from Reva. This time it said, Hope.

  His eyes went to the window but Reva texting him because she couldn’t phone him seeing as he was on the phone had taken too much time.

  A knock came at the door and his gaze turned there to see Hope standing in it, her face soft.

  Shit.

  He did what he could to make the call he was on short and then ended it.

  The minute he put the handset in the receiver, still in the door, she called quietly, “Hey.”

  “Hope, whatever this is, I really can’t do it now,” he returned.

  Unsurprisingly, he said that and his ex-wife walked right in.

  Hix rose from his seat.

  “You doin’ okay?” she asked.

  “I’m working.”

  “I know,” she said, again quiet. “I heard, Hix. God.” She shook her head coming to a stop right across the desk from him. “I’m so sorry. So sorry. It’s had to have been rough.”

  “I wasn’t married to him, Hope.”

  “I know, but you . . .” She looked to the windows before she came back to him. “You never liked the murders in Indy.”

  “Not something you like.”

  “I think you get me, honey.”

  He felt a muscle tick up his cheek.

  “I’m fine, Hope. Thanks for stoppin’ by but I got shit I really gotta see to.”

  She nodded. “Yes, I . . . yes . . . well,” she stammered, looked back to the windows, and when he got her attention again, he clenched his hands into fists at the hurt he saw stark there. “I just . . . I know now’s not the time but I heard you were, well, last night you went to . . .” She paused then said like she had to force it to come out, “Her.”

  It sucked that, after all her recent behavior, he totally could believe she came there not to see how he was doing but to share in her way she didn’t like it he was spending time with, not to mention doing, someone else.

  But they were not going to get into this and not just because it was none of her freaking business.

  “Hope—”

  “You know,” she started quickly, “that I know that I made it that way. That was my fault. But now I’m here to say that I’m here, Hix, if you need me. You need someone to talk to. You can come to me.”

  “Thanks for the offer,” he pushed out.

  “I know we haven’t been getting along real great, but that offer’s genuine, Hixon.”

  “’Preciate it.”

  “Seriously.”

  Christ.

  “Hope, I got shit to do.”

  Her body gave a small jerk and she whispered, “Right. Yeah. Of course. Of course, honey. I’ll just . . . get back to Mom and Dad’s. They say they’re thinkin’ of you and the team, and of course that poor family.”

  “Right.”
/>   “Well, better go,” she muttered.

  “Yeah,” he agreed.

  She looked into his eyes, sucking his time, making it clear the effort she was expending to force a smile his way at the same time still not hiding the hurt she felt he’d gone to Greta and not giving him a hint of the concern she was pretending to feel for him, which was the lie behind the reason she’d come there.

  “Talk to you later?” she asked.

  He didn’t know what to say to that without saying something he shouldn’t so he decided just to keep his mouth shut.

  “Okay, well . . . later.”

  “’Bye, Hope.”

  She nodded, hesitated, and when he said no more and gave her nothing, she turned and slowly walked to the door, giving him ample time to call her back.

  He did not.

  He also didn’t look out the window to watch her go.

  He sat down, texted all his deputies to let them know the notice would go up on the Guide website within the hour, walked out to Reva to give her that same news, went back to his office and got back on the phone.

  He was into his final call when his cell beeped again.

  He bit back a curse as he listened to the sheriff of Wheeler County telling him he’d keep his crew sharp in keeping an eye out for Calloway’s truck.

  But he felt himself relax when the text displayed faded away.

  He got off the call, picked up his cell and engaged it, fully reading Greta’s text.

  Folks at the Harlequin say you got a thing for their Reuben so I’m bringing you one even if I have to drive it all the way across the county. So text me your whereabouts, smokey.

  He grinned as he texted back, Office, babe.

  I’ll be there soon, she replied.

  She didn’t lie and ten minutes later Hix caught her coming in.

  He got up and moved out to go and get her.

  “Hey,” she called when she saw him come out of the back hall.

  “Hey,” he replied. “Come on back.”

  She glanced to Reva, smiled that way then came through the swinging half door.

  He met her halfway down the aisle and turned. Taking the plastic bag with the Styrofoam box flattening the bottom from her hand, he put his other hand to her elbow and led her to his office.

  He let her go and went right to the whiteboard, flipping it around so the timeline and the photos taped to it were not facing the room. This was not so she wouldn’t see confidential details of an investigation, but so she wouldn’t see disturbing photos of a dead man.

  “Is this okay?” she asked as he turned to her, her eyes to the now blank board.

  “What?” he asked in return.

  She looked to him. “Coming here.” She lifted her hand to indicate the bag. “Bringing you lunch.”

  He smiled. “Hell yeah.”

  She smiled back.

  Hix looked down and opened the knots to the bag, seeing inside there was only one tray.

  He raised his head. “Nothing for you?”

  “It’s my day off,” she told him. “And I’ve got a ton to do so I’m just dropping that off to make sure you eat something and then I have to get to doing it.”

  “Right,” he replied, having a ton to do too but thinking he wished part of it was being able to spend fifteen minutes eating a sandwich with her.

  “That ton to do includes buying another bottle of bourbon,” she shared. “I’m running low.”

  Hix smiled again. “Right.”

  “And, well . . . um, buying other things,” she went on.

  Hix started chuckling. “I get a say in priority of these two items, bourbon would come in second.”

  Greta started laughing.

  It died away, she gave him a close look and what was behind her eyes was not about her, it was about him.

  “You doin’ okay?” she asked softly.

  “Yeah, babe.”

  “Okay,” she whispered.

  “Though one thing I’m not doin’ okay about is that I’d really like to kiss you to say thanks for the Reuben. But Reva wouldn’t share shit that happened in this department that had to do with sheriff business, even if she was waterboarded. Gossip does not hold that same level of confidentiality. Not even close.”

  She was back to smiling when she said, “I understand.”

  He wasn’t far away from her but he got closer. “Tonight, meet you at your porch.”

  “Okay,” she replied.

  “Don’t know when, it might be late, but I’ll text you before I show.”

  “Sounds good, Hixon.”

  “And thanks for lunch, Greta.”

  She swayed to him, her eyes to his, but didn’t touch him. “My pleasure, snuggle bug.”

  He chuckled again.

  She grinned, reached out and touched a finger to the back of his hand and said, “Later.”

  He knew the response to that.

  “Yeah, sweetheart, later.”

  She kept grinning at him even as she turned and walked out the door.

  Hix watched her leave his department, doing it waving again at Reva.

  Then he went back to the whiteboard, flipped it back around, pulled the Styrofoam out of the bag, set the bag aside, opened the box and ate, standing up and staring at the board in front of him.

  Half the sandwich gone, pickle decimated, one bite into the second half, Hix froze, and mouth full, he mumbled, “Shit.”

  He closed the Styrofoam, went to his desk and nabbed his cell.

  He shoved it in his breast pocket, and still carrying the sandwich, he took off out the door, going to Reva and only saying, “You got reception,” before he hauled ass out of the building.

  He ate the rest of the sandwich in his Ram between phone calls.

  “You got this from scrapes?” Donna asked.

  They were standing on the shoulder of County Road 56, seven miles up from Grant into McCook County, only distant farmhouses dotting the landscape, the rest just field, both the men of Cherry County’s forensics team squatted in the tall grass about six feet from the road, digging in the turf.

  “Concrete’s graded,” Hix said, watching forensics, Donna standing close to him, Larry, Bets and Hal all out in the grass in different directions, heads bent, walking slow, swishing with their batons through the grass.

  “And?” Donna prompted.

  He looked to her.

  “Heels of both his palms had bruising come up, not dark, didn’t catch it because of that, but it was there. Once I noticed that, it delineated scrapes that would indicate they cut in on the diagonal. Grading of the road goes side to side to allow water runoff. If he was runnin’ down the road and took a header into his hands, that bruising and those scrapes would be horizontal. But they were diagonal, which meant he was running off the road.”

  “And that?” she tipped her head to where forensics was digging.

  “We were lookin’ for a bloodstain and shell casings on the road yesterday, Donna. Drove down to Grady’s, drove back and did it slow. Took me nine miles and I saw that grass depressed, broken grass on the way to it that could seem beaten down by rain yesterday. That depression looks natural, unless you’re lookin’ for it. And that grass bouncin’ back in the sun today, the broken grass not doin’ that, you can see the path that leads to the depression. Yesterday, figure it didn’t look like that. Today, didn’t have to look hard to find it.”

  He jerked his head to the bullet in an evidence bag weighed down by a rock on the hood of his truck, which was one bag amongst many that mostly contained cigarette butts and their bonus find: three shell casings. Two they’d found in the turf not far from the road, one had been knocked, probably by cars, to the opposite side of the road where yesterday they didn’t look.

  “He went down on the road when he took one in the shoulder,” Hix told her. “Got up, kept running. Shooter followed him. Got off two more rounds while he was in the grass, going after him. The one that hit his shirt, the one that got him in the neck.”


  “So guy did him, carried him out, and did it in a hurry, not bothering to clean up after himself,” Donna noted.

  “Not a high traffic area, houses not even a little close, but he killed a man and folks around these parts stop, they think someone’s in trouble. He got that body, put it in Nat’s truck, and got the hell outta here.”

  She looked from the grass to Hix. “No other vehicle? No partner?”

  “Got nothing on this road or the shoulder, such as it is, to give us tire impressions, rain took that, and obviously no skid marks to say he’d been run off the road.” Hix shook his head. “Donna, gut tells me the man stopped to help someone out. I’m thinkin’, guy pulled a gun, my guess, he wanted Nat to drive, but Calloway thought his best bet was to get his ass outta his truck and run. The man tried to steal his truck, Calloway saw his face, man panicked.”

  “You thinkin’ fugitive like Bets said?” Donna asked.

  “I’m thinkin’ a fugitive that would do something fool enough to jump bail or run from the cops after he’d committed a crime would know that what he’d get for stealin’ that truck would be a whole lot better than what he’d get for shooting a man and definitely killing him.”

  “Tweaker,” she murmured.

  “Blatt saw to the fact no meth was sold in our county and I gotta admit a good byproduct of that deal is, since McCook’s meth man doesn’t sell close to home, he’s not a big fan of someone else’s product hitting his county, so he shuts that down before we gotta lift a finger.”

  “Man could be from outta town, Hix.”

  “Then how would he know about that game trail?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. True.”

  Hix looked back to the grass. “Least we got a crime scene.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And meth isn’t the only shit that could string someone out.”

  “Yeah.”

  His cell rang and Hix pulled it out of his breast pocket to see it was the chief at Dansboro Police.

  “Gotta take this,” he muttered.

  “Gotta help out,” she muttered back, then waded into the grass.

  Hix took the call, hoping he’d get word on a Ford F150.

  Instead, the fact they’d found the scene of the crime got out and he found himself giving an update.

  He gave it, waded in the grass a different direction than any of the bodies out there, and helped out.