“I wanted something stronger, something irrefutable, if I could get it, and I was willing to wait. Of course, it’s been long enough now that the statute of limitations has run out.”
“So there wouldn’t be any legal consequences if these guys were to be exposed.”
“No, only personal. But you know, the contributions you feel you’ve made over your lifetime, the legacy you feel you’ve built—to have all that ruined by some nasty old scandal getting exposed all over the place—” Kip broke off, shrugging.
Caroline pushed away the mug of coffee the waitress had brought. She’d barely drunk any of it.
“College sports is a pretty small world,” Kip went on. “Everybody knows everybody else, and when someone goes down, the rest of us—the rest of the world—can’t get enough. We’re like vultures at the feast.”
“You’re talking about media coverage. It would be all over the news.”
“I think so, yes.”
“You would know, I guess.”
“It is my profession.”
“Will you resurrect the story now?”
“You mean if you were to find your dad? Probably not, for the same reason I couldn’t publish it at the time: lack of hard evidence.”
Caroline got out her car keys. “I’ve kept you long enough.”
Kip brushed off her comment with a small sweep of his hand. He insisted on paying the check and walking her to her car. He said if he could be of further help, she should call him. “Will you keep me posted on your search? I’d love to know if you find him.”
“I will,” Caroline said.
“You’ll be careful? I’m serious about you talking to the cops. It couldn’t hurt to go on the record, so to speak.”
“I’ve got someone in mind for that,” Caroline said. “An old friend I went to high school with. He’s a sheriff’s deputy.” She refrained from speaking his name. It was business, nothing personal.
“Good,” Kip said. He looked relieved.
Watching the reporter cross the parking lot to his car, she had a hunch that regardless of his reservations regarding hard evidence, when she found her dad, Kip would resurrect the story. He’d rewrite it, of course, and it scared her, as she wondered how it would end.
12
Harris—Saturday, January 13
He keeps still on waking, holding on for as long as he can to the vain belief that where he is—on his belly, feet hanging off a too-short bed—is a dream and not the bald fact and circumstance of his life now. But he knows—knows this bed is his kid bed. The one his mom has kept all these years in his kid room in her house, the big white farmhouse on 14.9 acres eleven miles outside Wyatt. Eleven miles from the home in town that he shares with his wife and his sons—his family that he loves more than—
If you loved us, you would stop.
That declaration Holly throws in his face on a regular basis whispers through Harris’s brain, a truth he doesn’t want to hear. Stop the drug taking; stop the lying about it. Holly thinks that’s the extent of it—his crimes, his sins. She doesn’t know the half.
Harris plants his face in his pillow, stifling the sound that wants to come—some god-awful noise—jamming it against his ribs. Holly and Connor and Kyle will be at the breakfast table about now, talking about Harris. Holly will be doing her best to explain why Dad is gone. Harris needs help, she’ll say; he isn’t in any shape to be their father right now. He’s not the man I married. Harris hears her voice in his brain. Or any sort of man at all. His mind takes it a step further.
It half kills him, thinking of Kyle and Connor, how they’ll react. Kyle’s disgust, his sneering dismissal of Harris, is a given. Connor is younger, softer. He’ll be bewildered and sad. Come home, Dad. Why can’t you just stop taking that stuff, Dad? Harris imagines Connor will say—or something like it. How will he face his sons? He doesn’t even know how he’ll get out of this bed and face his mother.
He rolls onto his back. She let him off the hook last night when he showed up on her porch. He rang the bell like a stranger. He felt like one. He does still. He belongs—fits—nowhere. I don’t know who you are anymore, Holly said to him last night. He doesn’t recognize himself, Harris thinks. He doesn’t know how his life got so fouled up.
A soft rapping draws his glance to the closed bedroom door.
“I’m in the kitchen,” his mother says. “I’ve made coffee.”
He hears her footsteps retreat, her light tread on the stair.
Time to fess up, pay the piper, face the music.
Harris stares at the ceiling. He can’t think what story he can invent, what line he can come up with, that his mother won’t see the lie right through. He is so tired anyway of the deceit. But he can’t think how to set down the burden, the millstone he is around his own neck. He wishes he had someone to talk to. A friend. A real one and not some shrink who’s paid to act the part. There’s Zeke, but Harris has clouded the relationship with so much half truth and subterfuge he has no idea how to sort it out. Zeke won’t stand for it, anyway, once he knows how he’s been used.
It’s Hoff Harris wants, whom he wishes he could talk to, and the want is an ache, a gaping hole in the dead center of his heart, one that feels as fresh as if it were new. He can’t sort out where it’s coming from, why it feels so raw now after all these years. But lately everything hurts. His heart, his brain. It is pain that feels soul deep. Harris settles his elbow over his eyes, burning now.
He thinks of when he and his mom left Oklahoma, the fear that drove them from there. Something else he has to hide, that he can’t talk about. It seems he’s been afraid ever since. Afraid and alone. Isolated. Abandoned. What if he were to go back, find his birth father, and look him in the face? What would he see? A man or a monster? Would it settle anything, bring him peace, some of that elusive closure he’s heard so much about? But he can’t lie here feeling sorry for himself. His mom is downstairs; she wants to talk. He thinks of how the conversation will go, how she’ll try to dig it out of him, what’s wrong, what’s happening. She’ll name ways to fix it, fix him. He thinks of the extra fentanyl patch Zeke gave him. The war of his thoughts sets his head on fire.
Harris meets his mother’s glance briefly on entering the kitchen and acknowledges her “good morning” with his own. They are both somber. He pours coffee for himself, holds out the carafe, an offering.
“I’m fine,” she says.
He flips a chair around, sits on it backward. It’s a habit from his kid days—like the back of the chair puts a barrier between him and his mother, her glances that are too penetrating, too all-seeing. The tile floor under his bare feet is cold. The patch on his upper arm itches. He holds his coffee mug firmly in his hands.
“So,” she says.
“I’m sorry,” he begins, then stops.
She waits.
Harris drops his gaze. Their shared history crowds the air between them, rife with the old panic, the images that he knows haunt her dreams as well as his own. Sometimes Harris thinks they’re more bound by the nightmare they lived through than they are even by love. Her only wish is—has always been—for his happiness. How often has she told him that? He thinks not for the first time how lucky he is to have her for his mother. She’s always here for him no matter what, a constant in his life. Except for the brief handful of years when Hoff was here, she has had sole responsibility for Harris, raising him, providing for him, protecting him on her own. When he was growing up, she made a thing of it, saying they were partners, a dynamic duo, their own Batman and Robin. He meets her glance, asking if she remembers, and he’s glad for her smile, but it doesn’t last. He wishes he could say something, do something, to make it last.
“Holly called me,” she says.
“Again?”
“She’s upset, Harris. You aren’t communicating—”
“I tried the other day. She had an appointment.” He’s pissed, and he knows he’s got no right to be, but it’s as if Holly is tattling on him. What do
es she want his mom to do? Ground him?
“It goes deeper than one attempt on your part, and you know it. I’m sorry, but she’s right—if you’re not willing to face that you have a drug problem, she’s right to send you packing.”
“Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence, Mom.”
“Harris, look at yourself.”
Her stare is fixed on his hands, holding his mug, shaking it badly enough that some slops over the edge. He sets it down.
“You need to get help, Harris. If you can’t do it for yourself, do it for Holly and your sons. I know they mean the world to you—”
“Do you ever think about him?”
“Hoff? Why do you keep asking me that?” Her hand goes to her heart. “No. Why are you—?”
“I wish we’d known his daughter. Caroline. Wasn’t that her name?”
“Yes, but she didn’t want to know us, remember? We tried to make her part of our family. I made over a bedroom for her. We did all we could to make her feel welcome, but she—”
“Was jealous.” Harris repeats the explanation he was given. His mom and Hoff said Caroline would come around. She never did.
“Can you tell me what’s brought this on?” His mom is wearing her shrink look.
Harris drops his glance. “Do you ever think about what our lives might be like if Hoff were still here? I mean like when you were first married to him? I do,” he says quickly before his mom can answer. “I know it’s stupid,” he adds, looking up at her. Her eyes are wide, startled. He looks away again. “I’d probably have gone pro, don’t you think? I’d never have quit football, that’s for sure.”
“Oh, Harris, I know. I have always been sorry that you lost that too.” An underscore of futility threads her voice.
He gets his mug to his mouth, manages to drink.
“Are you buying drugs from Zeke, Harris?” She has her eyes on his hands, the way they shake.
Harris sets down his mug.
She goes on. “It’s what Holly suspects—”
“Holly doesn’t know everything about me, and neither do you.”
A stunned silence follows his declaration. He’s hurt her, and he’s sorry, but if he tells her, he’ll lose it. Everything will come out. He can’t do it to her, can’t cause her more pain. He just can’t. “It’s the issue with the kid at school—it’s on my mind,” he says instead.
“But you won’t say what it is.”
“I can’t.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
He doesn’t answer.
“Holly’s worried it’s something to do with Kyle, and that’s why you won’t talk about it.”
“She needs to trust me.”
“Trust in a relationship is a two-way street. It’s wrong to keep secrets from her, Harris.”
He locks her gaze, and he sees the dark and bitter flash of her comprehension knife through the shadows in her eyes as she takes his meaning.
The moment, burning with the remembrance of their secrets, lingers, elongates.
“I don’t know how to help you, how to help your family,” she says finally.
Her voice trembles, and any thought Harris had of laying it out for her, the truth he couldn’t tell Holly—that Gee is the problem, the ongoing issue, and why—evaporates now as if it never existed. It would be a relief to get it out, and he could damn sure use his mother’s advice. But as strong as she is, hearing Gee is behind the robberies, how he’s got Harris jammed up in his thievery, that even Kyle may be implicated, will be too much. She’s been through enough in her life. “It’s all right, Ma. I’ll work it out.”
He might have said more to reassure her, but the sound of the doorbell, followed by three sharp raps of the knocker, cuts him off. His gaze collides with his mother’s. She shrugs in answer to his unasked question. She doesn’t know who is there.
Harris stands, pulse tapping. “It’s probably Holly.” Or Kyle, he thinks, ready to have it out with his old man, give Harris hell. But it isn’t a member of his family waiting on the doorstep. It’s the police, specifically the police captain, Clint Mackie.
Harris’s knees loosen. His head goes light. It’s all he can do to return the police captain’s greeting. The sergeant, Ken Carter, is nowhere in sight. Mackie’s alone.
“Captain Mackie.” Harris’s mom joins them. She’s wearing a cardigan over a long-sleeved tee, and she’s holding the sweater’s front edges in a tight, white-knuckled grip. But she couldn’t be more shaken than Harris.
“Good morning, Julia,” the captain says. “I’m sorry to bother you folks on a Saturday morning.”
“We just spoke at school yesterday.”
Harris’s mother sounds totally mystified. A silence ensues, growing long enough to become awkward.
“How can I help you?” Harris’s mom finally asks. “Do you want to come in? The coffee’s fresh.”
“I just need a word with Harris. In private?” Mackie looks meaningfully at Harris.
“No,” Harris says. “I’m sure whatever this is about, my mom can hear it.” He isn’t sure, not at all, but to exclude her would only raise suspicion. He exchanges a glance with her, and her eyes are so anxious he almost reverses his decision. But she’s already opening the door, and Mackie is following her down the hall. Harris has no choice but to fall in behind them. Dread weights his steps.
“There was another break-in last night,” Mackie says, once they’re seated at the kitchen table.
Harris’s heart sinks.
His mom sets a steaming mug of coffee in front of Mackie. He waves away her offer of cream and sugar. “Todd Sullivan’s house.”
Todd plays for the Wyatt Warriors; he’s a linebacker. A good kid and so-so player with nice parents. Harris clenches his teeth. Fucking Gee! He’s broken his promise, gone off and robbed his own teammate? What a damn bastard!
His mother is offering condolences. She knows Penny Sullivan, Todd’s mother. Penny works in the office at Wyatt High.
Mackie says, “Yeah, she’s pretty shook up. Here’s the thing, though. We got a call early this morning, somebody anonymous, claiming they know who did it.”
Harris’s head comes up.
“Who?” his mom asks.
“They named Gander Drake—Gee.” Mackie addresses Harris, his stare unwavering.
Harris can feel his mother looking at him too. Now she’ll put it together herself that Gee is the student, the one Harris is having the issue with, the thief he’s protecting.
“Gee’s been questioned,” Mackie says, “prior to this latest break-in along with a lot of other students. Just in general, you know. But then this tip came in, so I went by and questioned him again before coming out here. I talked to both him and his dad.”
“What did he say?” Harris asks.
“Swore he had nothing to do with it, robbing the Sullivans or anyone else.” Mackie looks at Harris. “He says as far as last night is concerned, you can vouch for him. He claims you saw him in the weight room. He was working out. He’d had an argument with his mom, something about a missed dental appointment. He said he had to blow off some steam.”
Harris is dumbfounded. He’s known Gee was twisted, but he never knew he’d go so far as to use Harris to alibi himself. He never saw this coming. But now fury punches through his disbelief. Heat builds at his temples, behind his eyes. Don’t let it show, he warns himself. “When was it—the break-in?” Harris stalls for time. His mind is a train wreck.
“Dinnertime. The Sullivans were out to eat. They left the house around six thirty, and when they got back around eight, they found the back door ajar. Your wife says you were gone around that same time last night. You weren’t home for dinner. Is that right?”
“You went to my house?” Harris’s mouth is dry. It’s all he can do to stay seated, appear calm. He has no idea if his act is working.
“I talked to your son—”
“Kyle?”
“The younger one. Connor. He showed me his cast, said he broke his fin
ger at baseball practice last week. That’s tough so early in the season. He said he’s lobbying his coach for permission to play anyway.”
Harris’s mom laughs, but the sound is forced. “He told me the same thing. If anyone could do it, though, it would be Connor.”
Harris wonders, When did his mother speak to Connor? After Holly was done complaining her ear off? “Did you talk to my wife, too, this morning?” Harris asks Mackie.
“Yes. She’s the one who said I could find you here at your mother’s.”
Harris can’t even imagine how bad it would wind Holly up, finding a cop on her doorstep on a Saturday morning. He wonders how much worse it can get.
“It’s not a problem, is it?” The captain’s look is intent.
“Of course not.”
“So you can vouch for Gee? What time did you see him? He said y’all talked for a while. About what time was it? You remember?”
Harris grabs his mug, taking a swallow, making a show of it, mind clattering over the possibilities—that the captain will know it’s a lie if Harris covers for Gee. But what choice has he got? Maybe Mackie’s only looking for confirmation of what he wants to believe. Maybe he’s like everybody else, and he looks up to Gee, Wyatt’s own hometown hero and star, a role model younger kids can idolize. Maybe Mackie even thinks Harris is a good guy.
“You saw him?” the captain prompts. “You saw Gee in the weight room at the high school between six thirty and eight, eight fifteen last night?”
“Yeah, I had some paperwork to catch up on.” It kills Harris, covering for Gee. He wants to out the punk, call his bluff, and let him fry. Harris would do it, too, if he were the only one who would be affected by the consequences, if his family wouldn’t also suffer. There’s barely a snowball’s chance in hell now of making it right with them, but even that will disappear if they learn one of his students, his players, is Harris’s drug supplier. Harris has got to go along with Gee, play his dirty game. He can’t lose his family . . . he’s nothing without them. It nearly levels him, thinking this, but he can’t allow it. He meets Mackie’s gaze. “I was there, in and out of the office during that time, and I did see Gee. We visited a bit. I left the school around nine or so.” Harris names the time he left Zeke’s. He forces himself to hold Mackie’s gaze.
Tell No One Page 17