Rob Cornell - Ridley Brone 01 - Last Call (12 page)

“What the hell did I do?”

Paul wrenched a rag between his hands like a gooseneck, his muscles flexing. “Sheila told me what you said about me. That you thought I was stealing booze.”

I gaped at him, speechless.

“I don’t drink on the job. I never have. And I may not be the most law-abiding citizen in Hawthorne, but I never stole from you. Ever.” He dropped the rag behind the bar. “You really hurt my feelings. I thought I did good work for you.”

Paul always seemed the tough guy to me. Hearing someone like him talk about how I hurt his feelings made it sting all the more.

“I never said anything like that. I don’t know why …” I grabbed my head and leaned my elbows on the bar as it all came together. The cinnamon gum. The bloodshot eyes. The half-empty bottle of wine at her house. “Where’s Sheila?”

“In the office.”

I glanced in the direction of the office, but couldn’t see the door through the crowd. Pushing my way over there proved twice as hard as getting to the bar, and this time I didn’t get any smiles from sexy women. I threw the door open.

Sheila sat at the small desk. She jumped as if startled and knocked a glass over. The glass hit the floor without shattering, but spilled its contents. We both stared at the puddle of brownish liquid as if waiting for it to spell something.

The cheery voice of the man on stage singing about being in love poured into the room from behind me.

I swung the door shut.

The music cut to a throbbing hum.

Sheila dropped to her knees and moved her hands as if she meant to wipe the floor, stopping with her hands hovering over the puddle when she realized she had nothing to wipe with.

I scanned the desk, found the fifth of Jack Daniels, and shook my head.

“I spoke with Paul,” I said.

Sheila didn’t look up, didn’t answer.

“I’ve been so caught up in everything else, I guess I missed the signs.”

She did not even move her hands, holding them like she was warming them over a flame.

“Still, I don’t think I would have noticed. When I saw you with the wine the other day, it hit me I’d never seen you drink alcohol before. Ever. Not growing up. Not since I’d come back.”

Finally, Sheila clasped her hands together prayer-like. But she stayed on her knees, kept her head bent.

“How long were you on the wagon?”

She lifted her chin, looked at me.

“Almost thirty-one years.”

I closed my eyes a second. “Almost my entire life.”

“Your parents wouldn’t let me near you those first two years. They didn’t trust me with you. I was a very clumsy drunk.”

“I hadn’t noticed.”

She titled her head. “It’s strange. Maybe it’s age, but I’m infinitely better at hiding it than I was then. Would you believe I’m completely smashed right now?”

I offered my hand to help her up, trying to keep bottled the mix of anger and pity roiling inside me.

Sheila grabbed on and lifted herself back into the chair.

The rhythm of the muffled music outside the office shifted when the song changed, but the sound itself remained the same. The muted music, not the size of the room, trigged a hint of claustrophobia in me.

“I don’t even know what to say.”

“Call me a hypocrite. A liar. A disgrace.” She waved a hand. “They’d all be true.”

“Calling you names won’t solve anything.”

“What’s there to solve? Nothing can be solved. That’s why I started drinking again.”

“You’re not making sense.”

She leaned forward, almost slipped from the chair, and gripped the armrests to stay put. “You’re not the only one feeling guilty.”

“What have you got to feel guilty about?”

Her knuckles turned white as she throttled the chair’s armrests. “You’re so wrapped up in your little drama, you haven’t peeked out in over fifteen years.”

“Don’t try to make this about my parents.”

Her face turned red. “It has everything to do with your parents.” Tears streamed down her face. She grabbed the bottle of Jack Daniels and lifted it over her head. “Look at me. I’m unraveling. Thirty years sober, but I couldn’t go a day after they died without a drink.”

The muscles in my neck felt like they were cramping. Heat crackled through my face. “Don’t you dare blame them for your drinking.”

“I don’t. It’s me. I’m too weak without them.” She slammed the bottle back onto the desk and covered her face. “I miss them too much.”

I wasn’t going to let her get off that easy. She could drink herself into a stupor out of grief, but lying to Paul to drive him away, and then stealing from the bar was unacceptable. It wasn’t that she stole from me. If she’d taken money right from my wallet, it wouldn’t have felt like half as much of a betrayal. It’s that she stole from the
High Note
. Call me melodramatic if you want, but stealing from the
High Note
was like stealing from my dead parents.

“What would they think?”

Her lips peeled back. “How dare you? Every day you’ve begrudged what they left you. You’ve half-assed your way through every responsibility.” She stood. “I’ve been here since the beginning. I never left. I know exactly what they would think. You, on the other hand, couldn’t even begin to guess.”

My chest ached, and I couldn’t breathe for a second.

“I have stood by, watching you, with this weight on my shoulders, this
responsibility
your parents forced on me, to take it away if you didn’t put forth the effort—”

“I’ve put forth a damn lot of effort.”

“At first. But now you’re letting it slip, because of this girl.”

“Leave her out of this.”

The little bit of spilled Jack Daniels now filled the room with its smell. The fumes made me gag.

She said, “We’ve both been left with burdens neither of us were prepared to carry.”

“I don’t know what the hell they were thinking.”

“It’s a special place, one they cared for dearly.”

“More than they ever cared for me.”

Sheila jutted out her chin. “No. Eccentric as they were, and whatever their reasoning for drawing up the will the way they did, your parents loved you.”

“Eccentric’s another word for crazy. They probably thought it was a joke. Normal people don’t do things like this.”

Sheila made fists at her sides. “I won’t stand here and listen to you insult them.”

“They were my parents. I can say whatever I want about them.”

“How incredibly childish.”

She was right, and that only made me burn more. I couldn’t hold back. “So who gets the place? The ungrateful son, or the drunk?”

“I thought you didn’t want it.”

I finally ran out of smartass comments and kept my mouth shut.

“It doesn’t really matter, I suppose. It isn’t up to you.”

“I could fight this. Despite what it says in the will.”

“You’d have to find a lawyer as good as me.”

I had one last smartass remark left. “I’d just have to find one who’s sober.”

She clenched her teeth. “I’ll climb my way back.” But the way she looked at the floor when she spoke told me she had doubts.

I turned and opened the door. The wailing from the stage hit my eardrums hard enough to hurt. Whoever the woman was at the mic, she must have thought she was Axl Rose.

“Don’t worry,” I said over the music. “I’ll return the BMW with a full tank.”

I stormed out into the parking lot, ears ringing from the music and burning from my argument with Sheila. I didn’t see him until he grabbed my elbow.

“Closing early?” Tom asked.

I spun toward him, not in the mood. Off to Tom’s right and a couple feet back stood a wiry guy sporting a shaven head and a pair of thick horn-rimmed glasses. I could tell by the way he eyed me the man was a cop.

“This your partner?” I asked.

“Palmer’s helping with my caseload.”

Tom lifted his chin, the focus of his gaze locked on a space a foot from my face, as if he saw a dust mote floating there.

“Problems with business? You weren’t in there very long?”

“Twenty-six minutes and thirteen seconds,” Palmer said and adjusted his glasses.

I glanced back and forth between the men.

“You following me now?”

“All part of the job.”

“What do you want?”

Tom put on a hurt face. “You can go visit our old buddy Devil Man, catch up on old times, but I can’t stop by the bar to say hello anymore?”

Devil Man was Devon’s nickname in high school.

I shrugged, looking past Tom at this Palmer guy. I didn’t like the way he looked at me. I especially didn’t like that Tom had him tagging along like extra muscle. The whole set-up ate holes in my stomach like too many cups of strong coffee.

“Don’t bullshit me, Tom. I don’t have the patience for it tonight.”

“Are we not friends anymore?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Fine.” He chewed off a piece of his thumbnail and spit it out. “But Devil Man, he’s your friend now. What made you decide to rekindle that?”

The cuts in my arm from the shattered bottle itched. “Jealous?”

“Curious. Did you know feds arrested him about six years ago for some computer crime?”

I tried to hide my surprise, but Tom wasn’t fooled.

“He wasn’t charged,” he continued, “but it makes a person wonder what he’s doing in his parents’ basement. He always was kind of weird, wasn’t he?”

“We were all outcasts back in the day.”

He straightened, puffing up his chest.

“Some of us grew out of it.”

I checked on Palmer. He hadn’t budged.

“If you say so.”

Tom frowned. “What were you doing at Devon’s?”

I imagined Tom and his buddy skulking around in my wake during the day, questioning my every move, obviously waiting for me to lead them to Autumn. The itching in my arm flared.

“Playing video games.”

Palmer crossed his arms, still blasting me with his stare. The thick glasses might have looked awkward on so much muscle, but it added a laser-beam quality to his gaze. Maybe that explained his Poindexter style choice.

Tom peeled another hunk of nail off his thumb with his teeth. “You know what bugs me the most about all this? Just because we’re friends, you treat me like I’m not a cop. I’m investigating a murder, and you give me attitude.”

“What does Devon have to do with Doug’s murder?”

“That’s what I want to know. I thought you could tell me.”

“Let’s see,” I said, pretending to think hard. “Their names both start with the letter D.”

“That’s what I’m talking about. You refuse to respect me. This isn’t high school anymore, Rid. I’m a cop.”

I couldn’t stand the itching anymore and scratched my arm.

“For the last time, I don’t know where she is.”

“Maybe not,” Tom said. “But I know you. I know what this girl means to you. I know how stupid you get when it comes to women.”

I had a whole life before coming back to Hawthorne that I’d barely shared with Tom yet. The idea that he thought he knew me based on stuff from high school made it sound like my experience since then didn’t count.

“You know me? You knew me fifteen years ago, maybe. There is so much you don’t know about me now, it hurts to think about.”

I got right in his face.

“Look at me. Look good.” I waited until Tom dared look me in the eyes. “You still know the me that broke your fucking nose in high school?”

Our one big fight senior year, I couldn’t even remember what it was about, but I punched Tom square in the face, broke his glasses, and his nose.

Tom’s eyes wavered for a second, then I saw a new resolve there. He stepped up to me until we had no more than four inches between our chests. I could smell coffee on his breath.

“That was a long time ago,” he said, voice a handful of gravel.

I heard Palmer’s shoes scuff the asphalt, and a second later sensed his presence next to us. I didn’t budge from the face-off.

“This why you brought along Mr. Clean? To fight for you?”

Tom snorted. “I don’t need him.”

“Back off, Mr. Brone,” Palmer said. His voice had a strange lilt, long on vowels.

“Palmer,” Tom said. “Meet me back at the car.”

“I don’t think that’s wise.”

“Just go.”

Palmer inhaled deeply, nodded, and walked off.

A mixed group of guys and girls staggered out of the bar, laughing, faces flushed. They went quiet as they passed, sensing the tension between me and Tom, and picked up their pace.

“Now what?” I asked once the group had dispersed.

“At the very least, you’re looking into this yourself. Don’t deny it.”

I didn’t say anything.

“Is Devon helping you somehow?”

I probably could have leveled with him about the flash drive. It was a dead end anyway. But taking anything from a crime scene was a big no-no, and I didn’t think Tom would let me get away with it.

“Like I said, we were killing trolls and eating frozen pizzas. You know. MMORPGs on the computer. Go ahead and ask him.”

“I already did.”

“And?”

Tom’s face scrunched up. “He babbled on about something called a sword of excellence.”

Now I definitely owed Devon that singing lesson.

Tom said, “So this is what? A stalemate?”