Bad Penny (26 page)

Delia hugged her. “Yep, you’re all right. You’re just pregnant.”

“Who’s going to stay with Mom?” Charlie asked. “Someone needs to, even if she’s the only one who can see him.”

“I can,” Wilson said, then gave Cat an apologetic look, as if just remembering she had to be considered.

“We can take Cat home,” Delia offered. “She’s not feeling well, and she looks like she’s fading fast.”

Everyone made sympathetic noises, which Cat quickly blew off.

Wilson’s guilt worsened. He was torn between what he needed to do and what he wanted to do.

“Honey?”

Cat shook her head. “You absolutely stay, but I am going to take Charlie and Delia up on the ride. You’ll be better off if you don’t have two women to worry over.”

Wilson just shook his head and hugged her. “Thank you, baby.”

“Oh, Wilson, don’t thank me. Your mom has been there for all of us. Now she’s the one who needs you.”

“And you don’t?”

“I’ll always need you, Wilson, but not now…not with things the way they are.”

Wilson wrapped his arms around her, taking comfort in the steady beat of her heart against his chest.

“Call me if you need anything. I can be home in thirty minutes.” “I will,” she said.

Delia slipped her hand under Cat’s elbow. “She can stay with us if she’s afraid.”

Wilson and Cat looked at each other, then grinned.

“What?” Delia asked. “What did I just miss?”

“You haven’t seen her in action after a bail jumper. Cat’s not afraid of anything on God’s earth,” Wilson said.

“Except tornadoes,” Cat added.

Wilson brushed his finger against the back of her cheek. “Yeah, right. Except tornadoes.” He smiled.

“I’ll call you,” he added.

“I’ll be waiting to hear,” Cat said. “Tell your mom I’ll be saying prayers.” Then she was gone.

Jimmy was a bundle of nervous energy. He kept looking in the rearview mirror, half-expecting to see a cavalcade of cop cars pop over a hill with lights and sirens at full blast.

In his mind, he kept going over and over the run-in with the elder McKay, thinking how he should have handled it, how it should have gone down. If he had it to do over, he would have stayed his ground and emptied his gun into the bastard. If he had, he wouldn’t be in this fix. And, he kept telling himself, he would have done that very thing if McKay’s first shot hadn’t come so close to taking off his foot.

But what was done was done, so he continued to move in a westerly direction, looking for a place to redefine his appearance and make a new plan.

In the end, Luis arrived at the Dallas Police Department half an hour late for his appointment with Detective Bradley, only to be told Bradley had been sent out on a case and wouldn’t be back in the office before tomorrow.

It wasn’t what Luis wanted to hear, but he had only himself to blame. He’d missed his exit off the freeway twice before he’d finally gotten reoriented. By the time he arrived, this was the result.

All he could do was leave his cell phone number on Bradley’s desk, along with a short message and a note of apology, and wait for Bradley’s call to reschedule. His next step would be to find a motel and a good place to eat dinner. He was about to leave when he realized someone here could probably give him an address on Cat Dupree, since she was actively involved in running down local failures-to-show.

The clerk at the front desk was handy. Since she already knew what he’d come for and had been the one to tell him that Bradley was gone, he would start with her.

“Miss Sullivan, was it?” “Yes.”

“I wonder if I could trouble you for one more thing?” “Certainly,” Jennifer Sullivan said politely.

“There is a female bounty hunter from your city who might have some information regarding the case I am working. Her name is—”

“Cat Dupree. Everyone knows her,” Jennifer said, then added, “Only it’s McKay now.”

“So you know of her? Do you know how I might contact her…maybe through her place of business?”

“Word is, she’s quit chasing bail jumpers since she got married.”

He frowned. “I see. Might you know where she’s gone? Or…how to contact her?”

“Oh, after the tornado footage, we all knew where she’d gone. She’s at a ranch outside of Austin.”

“What footage? What tornado?”

“Oh my gosh,” Jennifer said. “You’ve got to see it. It’s the most romantic thing you’ve ever seen.” She waved at a detective. “Hey, Joe, I’m going to take Detective Montoya to the break room to show him the Cat Dupree tape Shirley saved.”

“Yeah, sure. I’ll catch the phones for you till you get back.”

“Thanks,” she said, then added, “Follow me, Detective Montoya.”

Luis followed, listening with only a passing interest as she rattled on and on about what he was about to see. As soon as they reached what was obviously the break room, she waved him toward a table.

“Pick a chair,” Jennifer said. “I’ll get it set up. Here’s the deal. A few weeks ago we had one of our usual spring tornadoes. Do you have tornadoes in Mexico?”

“No, ma’am, hardly ever.”

“Well, we get a lot of ’em, and this one was really bad. Three or four people were killed. Anyway, a lot of local news crews were out filming after it had passed. You know how it is.”

He nodded, although he still failed to see why this was pertinent to his trip. But he was a polite man, and he continued to listen as she talked.

“Two crews, one in a chopper and the other on the ground, came upon a real-life drama in progress. They got every bit of it on film. We’re about ready here. Would you like some coffee?”

“No, but thank you,” Luis said.

“Okay, here goes.” Jennifer punched Play. “The man is Wilson McKay. He owns a bail bond business here in Dallas. The woman is Cat Dupree. And all this was filmed on the McKay ranch.”

Luis began to watch with ambivalence, but was soon caught up in the panic and fear on Wilson McKay’s face. And when the camera panned to the back end of a pickup sticking out of a stock pond and he realized McKay believed his woman was inside, he was hooked.

He watched McKay run into the water, then dive under. Every time he came up for air, Luis exhaled along with him, and when he went back under, Luis caught himself holding his breath and imagining the panic he would feel trying to find Conchita in the depths and darkness.

“How did the truck get into the water? Was there an accident?” Luis asked.

“No…no…there was a tornado, remember? The tornado dumped the truck in the pond.”

Luis’s eyes widened as his focus returned to the screen. Without thinking, he made the sign of the cross and watched as Wilson McKay finally crawled out of the water in obvious despair. Even though the only sound with the taped piece was the newsman’s voice-over, when the camera closed in on Wilson’s face, Luis felt physical pain from the man’s silent scream.

“Ah…Dios mio,” he whispered, watching as Wilson put on his boots and then began circling the pond toward the dam.

“Where is he going?” Luis asked.

“Just watch,” Jennifer said.

Suddenly McKay disappeared off the side of the dam.

Luis thought he’d fallen. But before he could ask, the perspective switched to a view from the air. He saw McKay pick up a boot at the bottom of the dam, then clutch it to his chest. When McKay suddenly started walking away, Luis wondered if he had seen her body? No, wait. He knew she wasn’t dead. Then what?

McKay pulled something from a bush. It looked like a piece of cloth.

Dear God, was that a piece of her clothing? Luis wondered, all the things that made him a good detective running through his mind. When he saw McKay suddenly look up, he realized the man had just become aware of the chopper. When he saw McKay turn and stare off into the distance, he scooted to the edge of his chair, watching as the camera panned the horizon, giving him the feeling that he was seeing everything through Wilson McKay’s eyes.

It took a moment for Luis to realize he was seeing movement, then several more before he could tell he was looking at a woman staggering through the debris left by the storm.

The longer he watched, the more certain he became that, except for the mud on her body, the woman was naked. Then the camera panned back to the expression on McKay’s face. The joy Luis saw was so vivid it brought tears to his eyes. He saw McKay running, and even though he couldn’t hear him, he knew McKay was calling her name. By the time they embraced, Luis was crying unashamedly.

“Yeah,” Jennifer said. “It does it to all of us…every time we watch.”

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” Luis said. “How did she get out of the water?”

“Oh, that’s another thing. She was never in it. Said she woke up without a stitch of clothes, lying faceup on the windshield of the truck. They think she was sucked out of the truck when the windshield popped. She and the windshield went one way, while the truck did a swan dive into the pond.”

“And she’s all right?” Luis asked.

“Well enough to get married a few days later.”

Luis didn’t know what to say or what to think. He did know that he didn’t want to find out later that this woman was guilty of anything but bad luck —or good fortune. It all depended on how one viewed what he’d just seen.

He stood abruptly. “I thank you for showing me this. Please make sure Detective Bradley has my apologies for my late arrival, and tell him I hope to speak to him tomorrow.”

“Sure thing.”

“Where did you say this woman is now?”

“On a ranch west of Austin. I’m friends with a woman who knows Wilson’s secretary. She told my friend that McKay and Dupree are both quitting the bail bond business to live on the family ranch.”

Once more Luis’s suspicions returned. Quitting? Not many could afford to do that—unless they’d come into a bunch of money. Like the money Tutuola was reported to have had.

Was that what had brought Dupree back to Mexico the second time?

Now he knew he could not leave Texas without talking to this woman. Even if she had survived a terrible ordeal, as far as Luis was concerned, her troubles were far from over.

Jimmy Franks knew the minute he saw the old barn in the middle of nowhere that he’d found a good place to hide. The gate into the pasture was hanging on one hinge, with only a piece of baling wire holding it upright. The trail from the road to the barn was overgrown with weeds, which meant no one came here often. Privacy. Exactly what Jimmy wanted.

He was tired and hungry and needed a fix.

With one quick glance up and down the deserted highway, he opened the gate, drove through, then re-fastened it behind himself before heading toward the barn at a fast clip.

The main door was off the barn. He drove inside without caution, only to realize that he’d driven over something hidden in the weeds. By the time he got out, he could hear the air escaping from all four tires.

“Son of a freakin’ bitch!” he screamed, and then walked back to see what he’d run over.

The iron teeth of a spring-tooth harrow looked a bit like the maw of a

growling lion. He kicked all four tires, then the fenders and doors, until the car was as dented as the tires were flat.

“Great. Just fuckin’ great,” he cursed, then popped the trunk and dragged out his gear. He downed the last two sausage biscuits left over from breakfast and finished off the last two beers in a six-pack.

“Time for dessert,” he said softly, as he tossed the empty cans aside, and pulled out what was left of a bag of crystal meth.

Five minutes later, he was so high he wouldn’t have needed another vehicle for a getaway. All he had to do was spread his wings and fly. Sixteen

It had been seven hours since Delia and Charlie dropped Cat off at the ranch. During that time, she’d mostly busied herself nervously doing whatever chores she could do and waiting to hear from Wilson again. He’d called her once about two hours after she’d gotten home, and now the silence was worrying her. The message regarding the false death report of Jimmy Franks was on the answering machine, but that was in the home office and she didn’t see the blinking light.

When she’d first arrived, the silence of the usually lively home was telling. But, to her delight, she’d gotten a packet of wedding pictures in the mail from LaQueen and John.

She’d spent a good hour looking at them over and over, remembering that feeling and how certain she’d been that what she was doing was right. It was, however, a bit strange to see herself in that pink dress. It made her look like a woman. She rarely thought of herself that way.

What a difference the love of a good man could make in a woman’s life.

To keep from thinking about what might be going on at the hospital, Cat had put away the food they’d been going to eat, fed the cats, put the jars of canned green beans in the cellar and snapped the last of the fresh ones that Dorothy had been going to can. She put them in the cooler on the back porch to stay fresh and then walked through the old house, listening to the silence.

The pictures on the walls and the love that held this family together were, for her, a physical presence she could feel in every room.