The Homeplace: A Mystery (31 page)

Over his shoulder, lights shone from the houses near the school. The lights at Town Pump reflected off the icy parking lot and colored beer and cigarette signs sparkled in the windows. Down the highway, stray snowflakes danced in the streetlights.

Something twisted in the pit of his stomach.

“Mercy?” He called louder.

Yellow candle flames turned the edges of the room ghostly. Shades and shadows tickled the walls. Chase looked at where Mercy had kicked her boots off. The feeling in his stomach tightened.

Something about the boots?

He nudged at one with the toe of his own boot. It toppled over. Grit ground into the sole sparkled in the candlelight. The edges of the heel were sharp, not yet rounded from wear. It seemed about half the size of his own boot. About the size of—

The shoe print on the bare ground at Coach’s.

That image became clear in his mind. The corner of the house had shielded a patch of sandy ground from the drifting snow. Flakes had dusted the boot print like grains of sugar sprinkled over cereal. It was just where someone would stand and reach down to get the key Coach kept under the rock.

Chase had been sure the track was left by one of the boys from the team, stopping by like he’d done all those years ago.

He could remember Coach’s invitation. “Let yourselves in. You know you’re welcome anytime.”

But what if it wasn’t a boy’s track in the dirt?

The footprint was about the size a woman’s boots would make.

A door somewhere behind the counter creaked, and a sliver of light stabbed the dining room. “Chase?” It was Mercy’s voice.

He couldn’t take his eyes off the boot. It was Mercy’s name scribbled in bloodred ink on the edge of Coach’s calendar.

“I’m so glad you came,” she called from kitchen. “I have something very special planned.”

*   *   *

Birdie gunned her pickup onto the highway.

Marty pulled his phone away from his ear. “He’s not answering.”

“He’s asleep in his trailer, or he’s in town somewhere. That’s the only places he could be.” She was guessing. “Where do we go?” She tapped the brakes and felt the rear wheels begin to slip on the icy road. She let up, and the truck slid through a stop sign.

“You choose, Birdie.”

“God, I hope I’m right.” She swung the wheel and tromped down on the gas. “Keep callin’ him, Marty. Keep callin’.”

*   *   *

“Mercy?” Chase nudged her boot again.

Half the women in Brandon wear boots like that one. It doesn’t mean anything. He cleared his throat and called louder. “There’s something I need to ask you.”

All was dark except for the candles. Behind the counter, a bright sliver of light outlined the café’s office door.

“You hear me, Mercy?”

The door swung open wider. The bright light painted Mercy’s shadowy silhouette across the café floor.

The woman in the shadow fiddled with her hair. Her head tilted, mouth puckered, and she dabbed on new lipstick.

“Chase, I made your favorite. Remember how much you liked Mama’s meatloaf? I used her recipe. Mashed potatoes with brown gravy. Corn, too.” The shadow smoothed the front of her dress. “I brought a bottle of wine.”

She didn’t hear me?
“Stop it, Mercy. We need to talk.”

Her shadow turned, and the curves of her figure filled the doorway.

“Oh, Chase, have dinner with me. Let’s pretend we’re in high school again. We’ll talk about all our dreams. How we’re going to leave Brandon and never come back.”

“Are you drunk?”

“Oh, no, Chase.” The silhouette rested a shoulder on the door frame. “You don’t understand, do you, Chase?”

“Understand what?” When he stepped back, his foot came to rest on her fallen boot. “I’m not sure I know what you’re talking about.”

“You and me, Chase. We both made mistakes, but we’re back together now. A second chance, just for us.”

The tiny hairs along the back of his neck stood on end, and spiders’ feet danced over the end of each strand. “Mercy, tell me what you know about Jimmy Riley and Coach.”

“No.” Her voice was different, almost faraway. “I invited both you and Lincoln to come to the café. He liked Mama’s meatloaf, too. I wanted the two of you to choose. But he’s not here. You came, Chase. It was meant to be this way. We both made mistakes, and all that’s over now. We can leave Brandon. Together this time. Like we should have all those years ago.”

Her words came too fast for his mind to sort out. “Mercy, answer me.”

“No, Chase.” When she stepped out of the doorway, light wrapped around her and candlelight glimmered off her shiny green satin dress. She took two steps to the end of the counter. “You always liked this color. That’s why I chose this dress.”

But Chase couldn’t look at the dress. All he saw was the rifle.

*   *   *

Sheriff Kendall turned off the highway and nosed his truck into the curb in front of the office at the Sundowner Motel. The
vacancy
light was lit, and the office sat dark. Big letters on a laminated card hung over the doorbell said:
Ring for after-hours service and give me time to find my robe.

The sheriff’s truck was the only vehicle in the parking lot except for an idling eighteen-wheeler near the street.

No sign of a TV van or Jody Rose.

He dug his personal cell phone out of his shirt pocket, scrolled down to her number, and hit Send. She answered on the first ring.

“It’s me. The sheriff.” He tried to put a little bit of country charm in his voice. “Where are you, Miss Rose? I thought we had plans.”

“Yeah. Hey, listen.” She spoke softly, as if she was trying to be sure no one else would hear. “We got called back to the Springs. I guess this storm is really something, and the station manager wants the whole team ready to cover the school closures and road conditions for Monday morning. I think it’s a bullshit thing to do to my story. But it’s not my call.” She sighed. “When the troopers couldn’t find Ray-Ray, I lost any bargaining power I had. I promise I’ll be back as soon as they let me. I still want that interview with Chase Ford. He hasn’t left Brandon, has he?”

That motel bed was going to be awful lonely. Cold, too.

Kendall slumped back in the car seat and turned his head. “I’m not sure about Ford. We cut him loose. No reason to ask him to stick around.” From where Kendall was parked, he could see the back door to Saylor’s Café. He remembered Mercy’s invitation and sat up. “Okay, Jody, let me know when you get back to my county. You know you can count on me to help out.”

He ended the call, unscrewed the cap on the bottle of Old Yellowstone, and thought over what Mercy had said earlier that evening.

He sipped his whiskey. The night was shaping up to be a little bit warmer.

*   *   *

Every fiber of muscle in Chase’s body drew taut. Nerves stood on end and adrenalin pumped.

Dancing candle flames reflected along the rifle’s blue-black barrel. A star-shaped spot of light glimmered from the center of the scope mounted on the rifle. The glow from the candles showed one finger curled over the trigger. She held the rifle’s muzzle level with the middle of his stomach.

Run.

Wrestle it away from her.

Talk to her.

Like a man standing belly deep in a rushing stream, everything swept around him. Thoughts jumbled, emotions twisted, and fear ran cold. Confusion focused into one thought, and it spilled out of Chase’s mouth.

“It was you, Mercy. You killed them.”

Her head nodded. “I had to.”

*   *   *

Kendall parked behind Saylor’s. He tapped a breath mint out of a tin box and popped it into his mouth to quell the smell of Old Yellowstone.

Smart woman, that Mercy. Tellin’ me to use the back door. This time of night no one’s apt to see the truck and start talkin’
.

He finished his whiskey and went to the door. The knob turned in his hand, and before he could call out, he heard her voice.

*   *   *

Shadows hid Mercy’s face, but Chase could hear tears in her voice.

“Don’t you understand? She was about to make a big mistake.”

“Who, Mercy?”

“Dolly. I tried to tell her. Tell her that Jimmy Riley would leave her like you left me. Dolly could make something of herself. Leave Brandon like I tried to and never come back. That boy was no good. I had proof, I did. But Dolly wouldn’t listen.”

“What proof?” Chase asked the question to keep Mercy talking while he stalled for a plan.

“Jimmy would look at me. You know the way boys do when they want something.” Her teeth flashed in the darkness. “He’d come by the café late at night after he dropped Dolly at home. At first we’d just talk. After a while, we’d share a sip of wine. Then he came to my house. It went on for three months.”

“What else, Mercy?” he edged a half step closer.

“I went to tell Dolly. I waited until Jimmy dropped her off after the game on Friday. Victor was here at the café closing up for the night. She was surprised to see me. I told her I had her paycheck. It was such a nice night I pretended I wanted to see her animals, and she took me out by the corrals. When I told her Jimmy was with me, she cried and ran away. I tried to stop her, but she slipped and hit her head.” Sorrow left her voice and a coolness took its place. “I put her in that big old trunk in Mama’s Lincoln.”

Her words punched Chase in the gut. “My sister? Dolly was my sister, Mercy.” He felt tears on his face.

“You didn’t care about her.”

Chase climbed out of his numbness. He tried to move closer, but she raised the barrel of the rifle so it pointed at the center of his chest. “They found her out on Sandy Creek,” he said. He closed his eyes for an instant and saw the crumpled body of his sister in the ashes of the fire.

“I had to do something with her. I took her out there before I opened the café on Sunday morning.” She took her left hand from the rifle and dabbed at her eyes.

“And Coach?”

“He was suspicious about me and Jimmy. I asked if I could come over after the game. I told him I’d be there after I closed things up at the café. Maybe eleven. I wanted time to be with Jimmy first. Coach was waiting for me. I tried to explain it was over. He said it was too late. He’d already decided to tell the sheriff what he knew.” She rested her head on her shoulder and then like a child said, “He turned his back on me and walked away. The knife was there on the counter, and…”

She’ll kill me like she killed him.

His muscles trembled, but he had to know the rest. “Jimmy? Did you kill Jimmy?”

“It was me, Chase.” She stepped forward, and for the first time he could see her face. Her lips were pulled so tight across her teeth that the lipstick looked thick and waxy. Shadows played over her face, and her eyes turned to hollow sockets. “It was me in his truck. You saw us. Down in the trees at the homeplace—where we used to go.”

The muzzle of the rifle dipped in her hands. Chase tensed. Mercy gripped the rifle tighter.

“We drove away laughing at you, and we saw those stupid buffalo in the field. Just like the Brandon Buffalos.” She spit the words out of her mouth as if they were something vile. “Like the high school team that everyone in this county is so proud of.” The muzzle of the gun rose until it pointed at his face. “Jimmy said he knew how to get them to come closer to the fence, and we went and got the hay. I took the gun and shot them when they came in. He laughed at me and I made him go out in the field with those precious Brandon Buffalos and I killed him there because that was all he was ever going to be. A basketball player for Brandon High School. And I hated him for it.”

*   *   *

Lord Almighty.

Kendall couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

Bright slivers of light framed the half-open door to the restaurant’s side office. Mercy’s voice came from just past the arch-shaped opening between the café’s kitchen and dining room. The door shielded him from seeing all but Mercy’s left hip and shoulder. She was talking to someone.

Who’s out there with her?

Her voice was soft and the words garbled, but he’d heard enough. Mercy Saylor was admitting to three murders.

Keep talking, Mercy.

He took his cell phone out of his shirt pocket and cupped it in his palm. He found the record app and turned it on. He knew he was smiling.

He wanted every bit of what was happening recorded on some little microchip in the phone. He’d solved the crime. Mercy would stand trial. He’d be called to testify.

Re-election for sheriff was a sure bet. State legislator would come next. And why stop there?

He held the phone out with one hand and drew his father’s forty-five from its holster with the other.

Congressman Lincoln Kendall. It had a certain ring to it.

Mercy must have lit candles in the other room. Orange shadows painted the walls. She took a step toward whoever was in front of her and when she turned, Kendall saw the rifle barrel.

*   *   *

“That’s your father’s deer rifle isn’t it, Mercy? Three hundred Weatherby Magnum. He bought it at the same time Big Paul bought his.” Like on the basketball court, find your chance and take it. No one would come to rescue him. “It’s a powerful gun.” He rocked forward onto the balls of his feet. She’d be watching his face and eyes. That’s what his opponents did on the ball court. He coiled the muscles in his legs to be ready for the one instant when she looked away. “But you know that. That rifle dropped each one of those buffalo with one shot.” He slid one foot forward an inch. “I didn’t see the body, but they said one shot from that rifle took off the whole back of Jimmy’s head. Think what it’s going to do to me, Mercy.”

She raised the rifle to her shoulder. “Don’t make me do it, Chase.”

*   *   *

Chase Ford?

Kendall almost licked his chops.

It would be so simple. As soon as Mercy shot Chase, he’d shoot her. He’d tell everyone he had pieced the evidence together and found Mercy at Saylor’s. Chase blundered in. Mercy had the rifle. He tried to save Chase but couldn’t and had to kill her. Everything would be recorded on his phone. He could fill in any missing parts about the murders. They could trace the bullets in the buffalo to the rifle. Everything was falling in place.