by Ace Atkins
“You know what the hell I’m getting at,” Holly said, turning away. Never being one for a fight. “Just not Chicago. It’s too damn cold. Okay?”
“Y’all shut your ass up and think,” TJ said. “Think. We need gas bad. We ran into Memphis on fumes last night. And maybe something to eat. After that, we’ll get as far as we can get and look at where we are then. If we need to, me and Ladarius can get some money.”
“Please,” Holly said. “I thought you both had a come to Jesus this summer and had given up all the break-ins and thieving.”
Ladarius grinned and nodded, agreeing with his girl. TJ knew that if things got real rough, no one was better for a little smash and grab at a house or a fancy car along the way, maybe trading up from that old minivan for something that the police wouldn’t recognize. Even though she and Ladarius were as different as different could be, a hard-ass redneck and smooth black kid from down in Sugar Ditch, they were survivors. If they had to steal, the Lord would most certainly understand.
“Come on now, y’all,” Domino said, standing by the apartment door. “Y’all need to get your shit and get gone. Sorry, cuz. But please don’t make no trouble for me.”
TJ helped John Wesley to his feet and told him to use the bathroom before they hit the road. The boy did as he was told as Holly gathered up their stuff. Domino hugged Ladarius as he headed out the door but blocked the way with her big ass as TJ tried to follow.
“You better not be lying to me, girly,” she said.
“I don’t lie.”
“Looks like you already pussy-whipped my favorite cousin,” Domino said, hands back on her hips. “You must be laying down some sweet stuff to drive that boy straight into the gates of hell.”
“I love him.”
“Yeah?” Domino said. “Looks like you already fucked up his mind. Just don’t go and fuck up that boy’s life. Ladarius is a good kid with a good heart. I don’t want to see his ass down in Parchman anytime soon.”
“We didn’t do it,” she said.
“Mm-hmm.”
John Wesley walked out and TJ helped her little brother into his coat. Domino cleared the doorway and let them pass out the door and back out into the cold. Rain fell across the parking lot in the grayish morning light.
“Better not be lying,” Domino said as TJ turned and headed down the steps. “Cops ain’t shit compared to an angry black woman on your narrow ass.”
* * *
* * *
Kenny was parked along the sloped dirt road to the trailer, looking nervous and apologetic as Quinn got out of the Big Green Machine and into the rain. As one of Quinn’s oldest deputies, Kenny was well aware he’d screwed up. Quinn didn’t have to berate him for letting TJ Byrd sneak out sometime last night, as Kenny was beating himself up plenty. He told Quinn that he hadn’t seen a vehicle come or go on the county road where he’d parked. They both knew the girl, her little brother, and two friends must’ve snuck out and rendezvoused a decent distance away.
“Shit, Quinn,” Kenny said. “I don’t know what to say.”
Kenny was bald and round, with a neatly trimmed mustache and goatee that had recently grown gray. He’d been one of Quinn’s first hires after he was elected sheriff ten years ago and cleaned out his uncle’s old crew. There might’ve been better deputies, but few more loyal and steadfast than good ole Kenny. Quinn had personally witnessed the man bury both his parents after the big tornado hit town, change into his uniform, and report back to the work the same day.
“Maybe someone’s still up there,” Quinn said.
“No, sir,” Kenny said. “I checked.”
“But given what happened to their momma,” Quinn said. “Maybe we need to get that door opened up and check inside. Just to make sure the kids are okay.”
Kenny winked at Quinn, getting the idea of what he had in mind. If Quinn had to run back to town and get a warrant, it would eat up a few hours. If TJ did kill her mother, maybe she left something behind. Or at least, maybe they’d find something to show where those kids were headed. Either way, they needed a look inside that trailer and around the property.
He and Kenny walked up to the top of the hill and mounted the cobbled-together two-by-fours and concrete blocks that made up the porch. There were no trees, bushes, or vegetation in the dirt yard, only the trailer on a little patch of land that appeared to have been scraped clean a long while back. Kenny knocked a few times while Quinn checked the windows. The windows were dirty and it was tough to see, but after a minute or two, Quinn found the door unlocked and they both walked inside the trailer.
The room was spare and not too dirty, with an old tan couch pulled out into a bed toward a TV silently playing one of those Fast and Furious movies. Vin Diesel racing down a mountain pass to rescue a woman on top of an oil tank trailer.
“Glad they got the whole franchise back on track after the one set in Japan,” Kenny said. “Did you see it? About them rice burners sliding all over Tokyo?”
“Must’ve missed that one,” Quinn said.
The small kitchen was bare except for a box of Cap’n Crunch. Quinn checked the refrigerator to find it empty except for a half bottle of Sam’s Cola. Someone had cleaned out the sink, wiped off the counters, and put away the mismatched cups and dishes. Whatever had been said about TJ Byrd, she wasn’t a slob.
“Well,” Kenny said. “You didn’t miss much of nothing. I mean you can’t have no Fast and Furious film without Vin Diesel. Although I did like that Paul Walker. Damn shame what happened to him, his buddy running that Porsche into a light pole.”
“Kenny?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You mind checking the outbuildings?” Quinn asked. “There’s a barn in back and a couple sheds.”
Kenny nodded and hustled out the front door as Quinn walked over and flicked off the television, Vin Diesel now driving backward alongside the truck, the truck driver shooting at him.
Quinn found what he believed was TJ’s room first, just enough space for a single bed stripped of sheets and bedding and a makeshift desk from sawhorses and a piece of plywood. Every inch of the walls had been covered in a collage of posters from before Quinn’s time: Def Leppard, GNR, even Mötley Crüe. He wondered why in the hell a seventeen-year-old girl would care about all that ancient stuff. The whole room like some kind of crazy mosaic of thirty-year-old movies, rock bands, and more recent newspaper clippings. local man dies in car crash. service held for valentine.
He checked her desk and under her mattress, knowing it would take some time to comb through the entire trailer. Just as he was about to search Gina Byrd’s bedroom, Kenny ran into the trailer out of breath, his face shiny with sweat.
“Got something to show you, Sheriff.”
“Can it wait?”
“No, sir,” he said. “Sure can’t. I was careful not to touch nothing in that old shed.”
They headed back out into the light rain, Quinn’s boots loud on the wood steps, and quickly rounded behind the rusted trailer. Kenny pointed to the open door of an old service shed like the kind you buy at a Home Depot or Sears to fill with a riding mower and toolboxes. He handed Quinn his Maglite and Quinn stepped forward and shone the beam onto a concrete pad stained with oil. What he spotted about took the breath from him. He stepped back, making sure he didn’t make a mess of anything around that shed.
“That’s blood, ain’t it?” Kenny asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“You see the hacksaw, too?”
Quinn didn’t answer, scanning with the Maglite around the shed until he saw the hacksaw not far from the bloody clothes and that one pink, high-heeled boot. Sparkly rhinestones all over the shaft.
“Killed her own mother,” Kenny said. “That’s some cold-blooded shit, Sheriff.”
“She burned evidence before,” Quinn said. “Why’d she leave this mess?”
“Maybe there wasn’t time,” Kenny said. “Those kids hightailed it right quick.”
“I’ll talk to Lovemaiden and let him know what we found,” Quinn said. “No reason to fight over this case right now. That can come after we track down those kids.”
“You gonna charge that girl?”
“Well, shit,” Quinn said. “I don’t believe TJ Byrd has left me with much choice.”
* * *
* * *
Holly was driving the minivan, everyone else asleep as she crossed the Mississippi River and into Arkansas. They could’ve gone east or north or so many directions, but the signs seemed to be leading her the fastest way out of Memphis and onto some new land, some new territory like in those old Western movies she watched with her granddaddy. TJ rode shotgun with her, leaning against the passenger door, using her blue jean jacket as a pillow, as Holly flipped around the radio dial. There were bellowing black preachers, Mexican music, top country hits, and hot rap out of Memphis. She didn’t catch anything that sounded like the news except for some man screaming about how the End Times were right around the corner. Right around the corner? Men like that have been peddling that story for two thousand years. She finally shut the damn thing off as she drove through West Memphis, all the gas stations and truck stops jam-packed early that morning.
They’d filled up when they left Ladarius’s cousin’s apartment, bought chicken biscuits, some Cokes, Red Bulls, and a chocolate milk for John Wesley. The boy had crawled into the far backseats and made himself a nest with all the boxes of assorted shit TJ had tossed into the van. Somewhere along the way, they’d run over their cell phones and tossed the busted parts in a dumpster. They all hated to do it but knew they’d probably been tracked since leaving Tibbehah County.
Holly worried what her parents were going to say and do once she got home. She hadn’t hesitated leaving with TJ for a hot second and now would be the one to get sent up to that Wings of Faith in Missouri. First thing they’d do is sit her ass down with one of Pastor Ben Quick’s folks to talk about a biblical solution to their girl’s wild ways. But doing this, riding out with Ladarius and TJ, didn’t feel wild at all. It felt like the only thing she could do. If she couldn’t stand tall with her best friend in the whole damn world, what use was she?
The warm air blowing from the heaters scattered TJ’s blonde hair across her face. She’d always been the pretty one. Her face reminded Holly of a china doll, so fine and pale, a perfect upturned nose and those intense-as-hell blue eyes. Her lips slightly parted, the raspy sound of her breath.
Holly kept it right at sixty, making sure they didn’t go one mile over the limit. Ladarius said the law would be onto them soon, and on the next stop, they’d need to change out the license plates. Maybe even find a new car. That’s the only thing that gave Holly a little pause. A new car. Just what would she do with Momma’s minivan? Her family had had this damn thing for as long as Holly could remember. The headrests still had tiny TV screens in them where she’d watched her cartoons and Disney movies, feeling so safe in the child’s seat, riding up high around Tibbehah and on long trips to her grandmother’s over in Lee County, Alabama.
“Where are we?”
She looked into the rearview, the sun glowing a bright white behind them. It was John Wesley.
“We’re in Arkansas.”
“Where we headed?”
“I don’t know.”
“Why’d we leave Jericho?” John Wesley said. “My sister won’t tell me nothin’.”
“Just taking a road trip, kid,” Holly said, trying to keep her tone nice and light. “You ever been this far from home?”
“Nope.”
“Well, you’re gonna see some pretty country out here,” she said. “Folks in Arkansas don’t cut down every tree they see. They got lakes and forests, beautiful green hills. You’re gonna like this a hell of a lot.”
That seemed to satisfy the boy for a bit. And Holly peeked a quick glance over at TJ, still fierce as hell in her sleep. A little blonde hair caught in that perfect mouth of hers. Holly reached over and pulled it away, her hand brushing TJ’s, feeling a funny pang in her stomach, as she caught the wheel again, driving west with no real plan of what the next day, the next few hours, might hold.
“Momma’s gonna be mad,” John Wesley said.
The kid wide-ass awake now, sitting up and peering over the bench seats where Ladarius was laid out.
“No, she won’t.”
“Hell yes, she will,” John Wesley said. “Momma said if TJ did anything else bad, she was gonna send her up north to some Bible school. She said TJ got to be a mess because she skipped out on church too many times to fool around with boys.”
Holly laughed and shook her head. Although she couldn’t argue with what he said.
“It’s gonna be just fine,” Holly said. “Don’t you worry about nothing, John Wesley. You hungry? I got an extra chicken biscuit up here. And half a Coke.”
She lifted her eyes to the rearview again and saw the boy give a big enthusiastic nod. She reached for the paper sack on the console and passed it back to him. Just then, she heard a big tumble and clunk under the hood, a hot revving sound coming from the engine. She checked the gauges, just like her daddy taught her, and didn’t see anything. The minivan kept on trucking along past another exit and more big billboards for the ole-time country cookin’ at the Cracker Barrel and signs for folks who had got themselves hooked on meth.
When she looked back down, the temperature gauge had shot up in the red. Warning lights flashing on her dash. Holly cussed some and slowed down the car, not sure what else she could do. Ladarius was up now, wiping the sleep from his eyes, and looking over Holly’s shoulder.
“Goddamn, girl,” he said. “You better pull over.”
“We can’t stop,” Holly said. “Not now.”
“Holly, this old piece of shit is about to blow its engine,” he said. “We don’t have no choice.”
* * *
* * *
The McCade family had a forty-acre slice of property down in Sugar Ditch shared by dozens of families but ruled by one woman: Della Mae McCade. The McCade land was two miles south of the Quick Stop and another three miles down County Road 121. The trailers and houses stood back to back, winding along a curved road that some say was the best in the county. Any supervisor who wanted to turn out the vote in Sugar Ditch had always made sure of it. There was a machine shop and appliance repair on the land, an illegal pool hall, and a meat processor. Miss Della Mae’s house sat at the top of the hill, appearing large and almost feudal to Lillie Virgil as she wheeled onto the smooth black asphalt of the McCade compound.
Miss McCade had been running things, taking rent from her people and keeping order since her husband, “Big Jack,” died about twenty years ago. Lillie liked the old woman and respected her hard-edged cynicism of the law. When she walked up to the door of the home, a fine brick ranch with black shutters and a concrete porch, Miss Della Mae was already there, standing in front of a glass storm door, hands crossed over her chest and a scowl on her face.
“What is it?” she said, cracking the door slightly.
“Wonder if I can have a minute of your time, Miss McCade.”
“I heard you was gone, Lillie Virgil,” she said. “Quit the sheriff’s office and moved up to Memphis.”
“I joined the U.S. Marshals Service,” Lillie said, showing her the badge that hung around her neck.
“And what’s that have to do with me?” Della Mae said.
“Came to talk to you about your grandson,” Lillie said. “Ladarius.”
“His momma lives down the hill,” Della Mae said, pointing. “That boy ain’t none of my concern.”
“Maybe I could come in for a moment,” Lillie said. “You’ve always been a big help to me.”
The old woman had let the door go from her fingers and stood there be
hind the glass, staring, studying on things. She finally shrugged, cracked the door, and nodded Lillie into her home. “Well,” she said. “Come on, then.”
Lillie hadn’t been assigned the case yet. But she would be soon. Lillie heard what Quinn had found in that shed after those kids disappeared, knowing it wouldn’t be too long before a warrant would be posted on the NCIC. Lillie had already put in a request to her boss, the Old Man up in Memphis, that she had prior knowledge of the Byrd family and the case and would like to be temporarily assigned to the North Mississippi Task Force. She wasn’t sure how he’d react but hoped he’d grant her request as soon as the order popped up.
Della Mae led her into her sitting room, taking a seat in a high-backed green chair that looked as if it was made of velvet. She had on an elaborate housecoat of red, blue, and yellow paisley and wore large, dangling gold earrings. Her hair looked fresh from the beauty parlor, stiff and high in black and grays, and her nails bright red, at least an inch long, and sharp as talons.
“Why you looking for the boy?”
“I think he’s in trouble.”
“That boy’s always in trouble,” she said. “Ain’t his fault. It’s the fault of Mr. Dupuy. That man’s not welcome here. And he should’ve known to keep to himself and away from my grandbaby.”
“Some folks think his girlfriend killed her mother.”
Della Mae McCade nodded, making a little sound with her tongue, and cocked her head.
“Y’all think Ladarius caught up in that mess?”
“I know it,” Lillie said. “He left town with the girl.”
“That girl running from the law?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Lillie said, leaning forward in the chair, hands clasped between her knees with the Sig digging into her hip. “Her name’s TJ Byrd.”