The Homeplace: A Mystery (29 page)

He’d proved that when he told himself that he’d come back to be sure that Dolly would have money for college. Things would be different at the homeplace. He craved its peace again. He could have made arrangements with the banker over the phone, but he wanted to see Brandon once more. On that one weekend in sixteen years, three people had died. As if the evil and everything he regretted had followed him to the prairie.

“Chase?”

Eddie’s voice coaxed Chase away from his thoughts. He took the invitation.

“We heard on the radio about you out at the fire. Must have been somethin’,” Eddie said.

“It was really Marty Storm that—”
Don’t make me the hero. I didn’t do anything.
Chase pointed to the car. “Hey, have Karen get behind the wheel, and we’ll give this a shove and see if we can get you and that little boy home to where it’s warm.” Chase motioned for Eddie to follow.

“Yeah, you’re right.”

Karen’s cowboy boots crunched in the snow. The door shut behind her.

Chase and Eddie put their backs to the car, caught the edge of the bumper with their fingertips, and braced themselves.

“Go,” Eddie shouted.

Karen hit the gas, and the car lurched forward.

Just as the tire began to spin, the two men heaved, and with a jolt, Eddie’s car pulled itself from the icy shoulder and slid onto the snow-packed road.

Karen came to thank him. Chase shook his head and flexed his cold fingers. “You two get on home.” While Eddie took her place in the driver’s seat, Chase opened the passenger door for Karen.

“Take care of that little boy,” he said softly.

Little Chase’s eyes were shut as he sucked the pacifier back and forth in his mouth.

“And when he’s ready to play ball, find me and I’ll come coach him some.” Chase reached in and squeezed the baby’s shoulder.

A puff of exhaust from the car swirled the snowflakes around his ankles. Chase stood and watched them drive away.

Maybe the one he’d hurt the most was himself. The best punishment would be to leave the place where a few people still thought he was good.

Chase started his truck. The wipers chased feathery crystals of snow from the windshield. Down the highway, Mercy’s mother’s car sat in front of the café. Tiny lights flickered in the dark dining room. Chase pulled in next to the Lincoln.

Before I leave I need to know if her name on Coach’s calendar means anything.

He took the slippery stairs two at a time and pulled open the door. A pair of wet boots sat just inside.

“Mercy?”

CHAPTER THIRTY

Clouds covered the moon, and darkness gulped up everything around Marty until his whole world became the next few inches he could crawl down the hill. He pushed the thoughts of Deb and the boys to a small secret place in the back of his mind. Cold stole all the feeling from his hands. If what he feared came true, he doubted he could curl a stiff finger around the shotgun’s trigger. He grabbed the next snowy handful and pulled himself forward.

Above the edge of the depression his body made in the snow, hard kernels of wind-whipped ice brushed over the covered ground and found the tender places around his eyes and lips not covered by the ski mask.

Far out on the prairie, perhaps a mile from the hillside, dots of white from headlights told him how precious the next minutes would be.

Could he save the troopers? Could he save himself?

A swirl of wind brought a wisp of smoke. Marty squinted though the harsh sting, and his tears froze at the slits in the fabric around his eyes. Then the warmth brushed across his face, teasing with false comfort for only an instant.

His goal on that lonely hill—the stovepipe—was only an arm’s length away.

He eased forward, daring the snow not to crunch under his knees and hands, paused, and strained for any sound from below him. As carefully as he’d ever done anything in his life, Marty peeled off his ski mask, packed it full of snow, and smashed the wet bundle over the chimney.

The snow evaporated around his fingers. Hot steam teased his nose and water hissed. The first warmth in hours lured him to hold his hands close for a second more, but he rolled back away from the stovepipe and kicked more snow into the opening.

Will I have to kill him?

Marty pulled the shotgun close to his chest.

*   *   *

At the sound above him, Ray-Ray turned from the slit in his fortress’s log walls and stared in the darkness above his head. Dust drifted down onto his face.

Somebody’s up there.

He pointed the muzzle of his rifle at the ceiling and thumbed back the hammer.

One more noise, you son of a bitch.

Seconds stretched. The blackness thickened around him until a splash of water showered down the stovepipe. Droplets danced across the hot metal. Steam merged with smoke and filled the chamber.

Ray-Ray’s eyes clamped shut. He buried his face in the dirty canvas at the crook of his elbow and gagged for breath.

Blindly he waved the rifle at the roughhewn boards that made the ceiling and jerked the trigger. A white flame rocketed from the barrel, and the sound fused with the smoke and steam around him, and all at once, Ray-Ray went blind and deaf.

*   *   *

Birdie caught hold of the tips of sagebrush that poked through the snow and held tight. For every three steps she climbed up the hill she’d slid back one. Marty had disappeared over the top, and the breeze stole away the sounds of his hands and knees on the snow.

A gust of wind cut through her coat, shirt, and long underwear. A dozen goose bumps rose on every square inch of her skin. Birdie was sure that hell had frozen over and at any minute the devil himself would hand her a pair of ice skates and invite her to follow him through his icy inferno.

She cussed Ray-Ray for what he had done. Said a few choice words to Marty for telling her not to follow him and saved the vilest for herself. For not listening to him. Birdie sucked in a breath of the frigid air, braced herself to start to climb again, and whispered out a string of the foulest words she’d ever said all at once.

A blast rocked the night.

Rifle shot. Ray-Ray.

That was all it could be.

Her lips quivered as she took in everything around her.

Marty?

Birdie moved faster than she knew she could. Up the hillside. Feet sliding, fingers grabbing for anything she could hang on to. Knees and palms in the snow. Clawing for the Glock on her hip.

Not because of the sound of the rifle.

Because she’d heard a man moan.

*   *   *

Ray-Ray struggled up from his knees. A foot slipped on the wet floor. He lurched toward the hot stove. His arm went out to stop his fall.

Hot steel bit into his hand. The stove rocked off the stones he’d set it on, and a stew of wet, smoldering wood spilled onto his boots. Acrid smoke funneled into his nose and stung his eyes. He tried to fill his lungs, but the air around him was thick and gritty, and his throat closed and lungs rebelled.

Instinct worked the lever of his rifle and racked another shell into its chamber.

Leave me alone.

He wanted to scream it and kill each of the devils that drove him to this.

Everything in his stomach filled his mouth. Ray-Ray doubled over and spewed the contents on the floor. Air wouldn’t come. He threw himself against the crude door on the side of his fortress.

Hinges squeaked. Lag bolts groaned against timber.

He fumbled for the cross bolt and tumbled outside into the snow. Frozen tree limbs snapped under him. He sucked in the cool air. The snow quenched the burn on his hand.

But Ray-Ray ran. Away from the place that was supposed to keep him safe. Down the hill through the snow to the tangles of trees and brush in the bottom of the Butt Notch. To where he knew best.

Leave me alone.

Leave me alone.

Or you’ll make me kill every one of you.

*   *   *

Marty’s ears rang from the gunshot. He waited for the pain to take over his body, and deep inside he knew what had happened.

He did it. He shot me.

Emptiness filled his chest.

Stay calm. Think. Think.

They’d taught him what to do at the academy. One morning an old lawman peeled back the front of his shirt and rubbed a shiny purple scar just below his shoulder. Every green kid wannabe in the room had sat stock-still. The old man looked at each face one at a time and said, “If you can think, you’re alive. Find the hole and start first aid. If you’re lucky, your partner’s already radioed for backup and the EMTs. If you’re all by yourself”—he was looking at Marty–“you’re the only sumbitch that can save ya.”

Marty knew the stories about gunshot wounds.

You don’t feel pain at first. The impact shuts down your nervous system.

He lay still. Wishing he’d waited for the troopers.

The shotgun stayed glued to his hands. He let it drop to the side. Still on his back, Marty flexed both hands.

Fingers and arms work.

He pulled off his gloves and ran his hands over his stomach, expecting warm blood to bubble up from a gut shot.

Nothing.

He found his belt buckle and inched his fingertips lower.

Please, no. Not there.

But the fellas were okay.

Thank you, God.

He raised himself onto his elbows. The clouds above stirred, and brushstrokes of gray moonlight parted the shadows over his legs and feet. He bent his right knee, set that foot flat on the ground, and leaned forward to examine the dark blotch on his pants above where his left ankle stung so.

He imagined his foot hanging from fibers of skin, and muscle, and shattered bone.

What would he be if his leg was gone?

He made up his mind right then that if it was bad he’d lay down and let the blood run out of him until he was dead.

Deb didn’t deserve a one-legged gimp.

He didn’t want to touch his leg, but he had to. He held his breath and moved his fingers closer to the dark spot above his ankle.

Find the blood.

But there was none. Black dirt covered the cuff of his pants. One of his fingers found a ragged hole the bullet had torn through the denim. When he probed further, he found a wooden splinter, no bigger than a matchstick, had stabbed through his sock and into the flesh on his lower leg.

He missed me. I’m not shot.

He pulled the sliver out and the cold air on the raw flesh felt good.

Thousands of
thank yous
filled his mind and he said prayers to the God that had watched out for him.

He climbed to his feet. Both feet.

Dark smoke billowed from an open doorway below. Fresh tracks led away from the door, and Marty spotted Ray-Ray running down the hill.

*   *   *

Birdie made the top of the hill on her hands and knees. Faint fingers of smoke filtered up against the dark sky. She found Marty’s ski mask wadded over the top of the metal pipe and could see from marks in the snow where he had lain on his back. His tracks led down the hill.

She gritted her teeth and followed.

*   *   *

Ray-Ray slapped branches away from his face, lowered a shoulder, and bulled his way through the tamaracks along the creek. The moon peeked through the clouds, turning the night a silvery hue. Ice splintered under his boots and freezing water soaked his pant legs and socks.

Some government man was following him. He could hear him fight his way through the brush.

In the shadows just ahead, a fallen cottonwood trunk leaned into the tangle of willows. He splashed through the frozen, swampy ground to the tree, ducked under, and turned back the way he came. He fed another cartridge into the magazine and pointed the big rifle at where his tracks crossed a clear spot in the brush patch.

Come and get me, you bastards.

*   *   *

Marty stopped where the tamaracks thinned and opened into a clearing. The wind had chased the clouds away, and the night was nearly as bright as day. He held the shotgun tighter to his chest and flipped the safety on and off with his thumb. Something didn’t feel right. Hair all along the back of his neck prickled.

He lowered the shotgun and swept the muzzle from side to side over the trail in front of him.

This had gone too far. Whatever happened if the troopers found him, Ray-Ray had it coming to him. And Marty cussed himself for thinking he could do anything about it.

Deb’ll kill me again if I get shot out here.

He lowered the shotgun and backed away.

“That’s far enough.” A voice boomed from the shadows.

Marty’s insides went watery. “That you, Ray-Ray?” he croaked. “It’s me, Marty. I come to help you.”

“With a shotgun?”

“Look, the state troopers are on their way. It’d be better if you came with me.” Marty squinted, trying to find where the man was hiding.

“Better for who?”

Marty knew the Winchester was aimed at his belly.

“Drop that gun,” Ray-Ray called out.

In all his training Marty had been told never to give up a gun. Ray-Ray had already fired at him. No matter how quick he could be with the shotgun, Ray-Ray’s gun was already aimed. If Marty didn’t do what Ray-Ray wanted, all Ray-Ray had to do was pull the trigger.

Marty let the shotgun slide from his hands.

“Now the pistol. I can see it under your coat.”

Marty’s only chance was to keep the man talking. “Listen, Ray-Ray, the shotgun belongs to the county. I don’t care if it gets scratched up, but the pistol’s mine, and I’m still payin’ off the credit card bill. How about I just lay it down?” Marty raised his jacket with his right hand, reached across with his left, and lifted his forty-five out the holster with his thumb and little finger. He held it up so he was sure that Ray-Ray could see he meant no harm. “I’m gonna put it down here so it doesn’t get snow on it.” He bent his knees and lowered himself. He put the pistol on top of a clump of weeds.