A Bend in the Road (19 page)

But the fact was
that Otis had indeed said “the same thing is gonna happen to you that happened
to Missy Ryan.” Two people had heard him, and that counted for something.
Enough to hold him, maybe. At least for the time being.  But was it enough for a case?

And, most
important, did any of it actually prove that Otis did it?

Icouldn’t
escape that image of Missy Ryan, her eyes focused on nothing, and because of
that, I became someone I’d never known before. 
Six weeks after her death, I parked the car about half a mile away from
my final destination, in the parking lot of a gas station. I made the rest of
the way on foot.

It was late, a
little past nine, and it was a Thursday. The September sun had set only half an
hour earlier, and I knew enough to keep out of sight. I was wearing black and
kept to the side of the road, going so far as to cower behind some bushes when
I saw headlights closing in on me.

Despite my
belt, I had to keep grabbing for my trousers, which kept slipping over my hips.
I had begun doing that so frequently, I had stopped noticing, but on that
evening, with branches and twigs pulling at them, I realized how much weight I
had lost. Since the accident, I’d lost my appetite; even the idea of eating
seemed to repulse me.

My hair, too,
had begun to fall out. Not in clumps, but in strands, as if decaying slowly but
steadily, like termites ravaging a home. There would be strands on my pillow
when I woke, and when I brushed my hair, I would have to use my fingers to
clear the bristles before I finished or the brush would slide without catching.
I would flush the hair down the toilet, watching it swirl downward, and once it
was gone, I would flush again for no other reason than to postpone the reality
of my life.

That night, as
I was climbing through a hole in the fence, I cut my palm on a jagged nail. It
hurt and it bled, but instead of turning around, I simply squeezed my hand into
a fist and felt the blood seeping between my fingers, thick and sticky. I did
not care about the pain that night, just as I do not care about the scar today.

I had to go. In
the last week, I had gone to the site of Missy’s accident and had also visited
Missy’s grave. At the grave, I remember, the headstone had been placed and
there were still remnants of fresh earth, where the grass had yet to grow,
almost like a small hole. It bothered me for a reason I couldn’t quite explain,
and that was where I set the flowers. Then, not knowing what else to do, I sat
down and simply stared at the granite. The cemetery was mostly empty; in the
distance, I could see a few people here and there, tending to their own
business. I turned away, not caring if they saw me.

In the
moonlight, I opened my hand. The blood was black and shone like oil. I closed
my eyes, remembering Missy, then moved forward again. It took half an hour to
get there. Mosquitoes buzzed around my face. Toward the end of my trek, I had
to cut across yards to stay off the road. The yards here are wide, the houses
set far from the road, and it was easier going. My eyes were locked on my
destination, and as I approached, I slowed down, careful not to make any
sound.  I could see light streaming from
the windows. I saw a car parked in the driveway.

I knew where
they’d lived; everyone did. This was a small town, after all. I had seen their
house in the daytime, too; like the scene of the accident and Missy’s grave,
I’d been there before, though I’d never been this close. My breathing slowed as
I reached the side of the house. I could smell the scent of freshly mowed
grass.

I stopped, my
hand pressed against the brick. I listened for squeaky floorboards, a movement
toward the door, shadows flickering over the porch. No one seemed to realize I
was there.

I inched my way
to the living room window, then crept onto the porch, where I wedged myself
into a corner, my body hidden from those who might pass on the road by an
ivy-covered trellis. In the distance, I heard a dog begin to bark, then pause,
then finally bark again to see if anything would stir. Curiously, I peeked in.

I saw nothing.

But I was
unable to turn away. This is how they lived, I thought. Missy and Miles sat on
that couch, they set their cups on that end table. Those are their pictures on
the wall. Those are their books. As I looked around, I noticed that the television
was on, the sounds of conversation running together. The room was tidy,
uncluttered, and for some reason, that made me feel better.  It was then that I saw Jonah enter the
living room. I held my breath as he approached the television, since he was
nearing me as well, but he never looked my way. Instead he sat, crossing his
legs, and stared at the program without moving, as if hypnotized.

I pressed a
little closer against the glass to see him better. He had grown in the past two
months, not much, but noticeable. Though it was late, he was still in jeans and
his shirt, not in his pajamas. I heard him laugh, and my heart nearly burst in
my chest.

That was when
Miles came into the room. I pulled back into the shadows, but still I watched
him. He stood there for a long moment, watching his son, saying nothing. His
expression was void, unreadable . . . hypnotized. He held a manila file in his
hands, and a moment later, I saw him glance at his watch. His hair on one side
was puffed out, as if he’d been running his hands through it.  I knew what would happen next, and I waited.
He’d start talking to his son. He’d ask what Jonah was watching. Or, because it
was a school night, he’d say something about Jonah having to go to bed or
putting his pajamas on. He’d ask if he wanted a cup of milk or a snack.

But he didn’t.

Instead, Miles
simply passed through the living room and vanished into a darkened hallway,
almost as if he’d never been there at all. 
A minute later I crept away.

I didn’t sleep
the rest of the night.

Miles made it
home at the same time Charlie was pulling up at Hailey State Prison, and the
first thing he did was head to his bedroom. 
Not to sleep. Instead, from the closet where he’d hidden it, he
retrieved the manila file.

There, he spent
the next few hours flipping and turning the pages, studying the information.
There was nothing new, nothing he’d overlooked in the past, but still, he found
it impossible to put down.

Now, he knew
what to look for.

Sometime later,
he heard the phone ring; he didn’t answer it. It rang again twenty minutes
later, with the same result. At his usual time, Jonah got off the bus, and
seeing his father’s car, he went home instead of to Mrs. Knowlson’s. He
scrambled into the bedroom excitedly because he hadn’t expected to see his
father until later and thought they could do something together before he went
out with Mark. But he saw the file and knew immediately what that meant. Though
they talked for a few moments, Jonah sensed his father’s need to be alone and didn’t
bother asking for anything. He wandered back to the living room and turned on
the television.

The afternoon
sun began to sink; at dusk, Christmas lights throughout the neighborhood began
twinkling. Jonah checked on his father, even spoke from the doorway, but Miles
never looked up.

Jonah had a
bowl of cereal for dinner.

Still, Miles
scoured the file. He jotted questions and notes in the margins, beginning with
Sims and Earl and the need to get them to testify. Then he turned to the pages
that dealt with the investigation of Otis Timson, wishing he’d been there in
the first place. More questions, more notes.Did they check every car on the
property for damage—even the junked ones? Could he have borrowed one, and from
where? Would someone at an auto parts shop remember if Otis ever bought an
emergency kit? Where would they have disposed of the car if it had been
damaged?  Call other departments—see if
any illegal chop shops had been closed down within the last couple of years.
Interview, if possible. Cut a deal if they can recall something.

A little before
eight o’clock, Jonah came back into the bedroom, dressed and ready to go to the
movies with Mark. Miles had forgotten about the outing completely. Jonah kissed
him good-bye and headed out; Miles went straight back to the file without
asking when he’d be back.

He didn’t hear
Sarah come in until she called his name from the living room.

“Hello? . . .
Miles? Are you here?”

A moment later
she appeared in the doorway, and Miles suddenly remembered that they were
supposed to have a date.

“Didn’t you
hear me knock?” she asked. “I was freezing out there, waiting for you to
answer, and I finally just gave up. Did you forget that I was coming over?”

When he looked
up, she saw the distracted, distant look in his eyes. His hair looked as if
he’d been running his hand through it for hours.  “Are you okay?” she asked.

Miles started
shuffling the papers back together. “Yeah . . . I’m fine. I’ve just been
working . . . I’m sorry . . . I lost track of time.” She recognized the file
and her brow arched up. “What’s going on?” she asked.  Seeing Sarah made him realize how exhausted he felt. His neck and
back were stiff, and he felt as if he were coated in a thin layer of dust. He
closed the file and set it aside, his mind still on the contents. He rubbed his
face with both hands, then looked at her over his fingers.

“Otis Timson was
arrested today,” he said.

“Otis? What for?”

Before she’d
finished her question, she suddenly realized the answer, and she inhaled
sharply.

“Oh . . . Miles,”
she said, moving toward him instinctively. Miles, aching everywhere, stood up
and she slipped her arms around him. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she whispered,
holding him tight.

As he embraced
her, everything he’d felt during the day came rushing back. The mixture of
disbelief, anger, frustration, rage, fear, and exhaustion magnified the renewed
feelings of loss, and for the first time that day, Miles gave in to them all.
Standing in the room with Sarah’s arms around him, Miles broke down, the tears coming
as though he’d never cried before.

• • •

Madge was
waiting for Charlie when he got back to the station. Normally off at five, she
stayed for an extra hour and a half waiting for him. She was standing in the parking
lot, her arms crossed, hugging her long wool jacket against her.  Charlie stepped out of the car and brushed
the crumbs from his pants. He’d grabbed a burger and fries on the way home,
washing it all down with a cup of coffee.

“Madge? What
are you still doing here?”

“Waiting for
you,” she answered. “I saw you pull up and I wanted to talk to you out of
earshot.”

Charlie reached
into the car and grabbed his hat. In the chill, he needed one.

He didn’t have
enough hair anymore to keep his head warm.

“So what’s up?”

Before she
answered, a deputy pushed through the door and Madge looked over her shoulder.
Buying time, she said simply, “Brenda called.” “Is she okay?” Charlie asked,
playing along.

“Fine, as far
as I can tell. She wants you to give her a call, though.” The deputy nodded at
Charlie as he strode past. Once he was near his car, Madge moved a little
closer.

“I think there’s
a problem,” Madge said quietly.

“With what?”

She motioned over
her shoulder. “Thurman Jones is waiting for you inside. So is Harvey Wellman.”

Charlie looked at
her, knowing there was more.

“They both want
to talk to you,” she said.

“And?”

Again she looked
around, making sure they were alone. “They’re here together, Charlie. They want
to talk to you together.”

Charlie simply
stared at her, trying to anticipate what she was going to say, knowing he
wouldn’t like it. Prosecutors and defense attorneys got together only under the
most dire circumstances.

“It’s about
Miles,” she said. “I think he might have done something out there.

Something that
he shouldn’t have.”

• • •

Thurman Jones
was fifty-three, of average height and weight, with wavy brown hair that always
looked windblown. He wore navy suits, dark knit ties, and black running shoes
while in court, which gave him a sort of country bumpkin appearance. When in
court, he spoke slowly and clearly and never lost his cool, and that
combination, along with his appearance, played extremely well to a jury. Why he
represented the likes of Otis Timson and his family was beyond Charlie, but he
did and he had for years.

Harvey Wellman,
on the other hand, dressed in tailored suits and Cole-Haan shoes and always
looked as if he were heading off to a wedding. At thirty, he had begun to go
gray at the temples; now, at forty, his hair was nearly silver, giving him a
distinguished appearance. In another life, he could have been a news anchor. Or
maybe a funeral director.

Neither one of
them looked happy as they waited outside Charlie’s office.

“You two wanted
to see me?” Charlie asked.

They both stood.

“It’s important,
Charlie,” Harvey answered.

Charlie led them
into the office and closed the door. He motioned to a couple of seats, but
neither of them accepted. Charlie moved behind his desk, putting a little space
between him and the visitors.

“So what can I
do for you?”

“We’ve got a
problem, Charlie,” Harvey said simply. “It concerns the arrest this morning. I
tried to talk to you earlier, but you were already out.” “Sorry about that. I
had to take care of some business out of town. What’s this problem you’re
referring to?”

Harvey Wellman
met Charlie’s gaze directly. “It seems that Miles Ryan went a little too far.”

“Oh?”

“We’ve got
witnesses. A lot of witnesses. And they’re all saying the same thing.”

Charlie said
nothing, and Harvey cleared his throat before going on. Thurman Jones stood off
to the side, his expression blank. Charlie knew he was taking in every word.

“He put his gun
to Otis Timson’s head.”

• • •

Later, in the
living room, Miles was nursing a beer and absently peeling the label as he told
Sarah everything that had happened. Like his own feelings, the story came out
jumbled at times. He jumped from one point in the story to another, then
backtracked, repeating himself more than once. Sarah never interrupted, never
looked away, and though there were moments in which he was unclear, she didn’t
press him to clarify for the simple reason that she wasn’t sure he could.

Unlike with
Charlie, however, Miles went further.

“You know, for
the past two years, I’ve wondered what would happen when I came face-to-face
with the guy who did it. And when I found out it was Otis . . . I don’t know .
. .” He paused. “I wanted to pull the trigger. I wanted to kill him.”

Sarah shifted,
not knowing what to say. It was understandable, at least on some level, but . .
. a little frightening, too.

“But you
didn’t,” she finally said.

Miles didn’t
notice the tentativeness of her answer. His mind was back there, with Otis.

“So now what
happens?” she asked.

His hand went
to the back of his neck and he squeezed. Despite how emotionally caught up he
was in this, the logical side of him knew they’d need more than they had now.
“There’s got to be an investigation—witnesses to interview, places to check
out. It’s a lot of work, and it’s harder now that time has passed. I’m gonna be
busy for I don’t know how long. Lot of late nights, lot of weekends.  It’s back to where it was a couple of years
ago.”

“Didn’t Charlie
say he was going to handle this?”

“Yeah, but not
like I would.”

“Are you allowed
to do that?”

“I don’t have a
choice.”

It wasn’t the
time or place to discuss his role, and she let it go.  “Are you hungry?” she asked instead. “I can throw something
together in the kitchen for us. Or we can order a pizza?”

“No. I’m fine.”

“You want to go
for a walk?”

He shook his
head. “Not really.”

“You up for a
movie? I grabbed a video on my way over.”

“Yeah . . .
sure.”

“Don’t you want
to know what it is?”

“It doesn’t
really matter. Whatever you picked up is fine.” She rose from the couch and
found the movie. A comedy, it succeeded in making Sarah laugh a couple of
times, and she glanced over at Miles to see his reaction. There wasn’t one.
After an hour, Miles excused himself to go to the bathroom. When he didn’t come
back in a few minutes, Sarah went to make sure he was okay.

She found him in
the bedroom, the manila folder open beside him.

“I just have to
check something,” he said. “It’ll only take a minute.”

“Okay,” she
answered.

He didn’t come
back.

Long before it
was over, Sarah stopped the movie and ejected it, then found her jacket. She
peeked in on him once more—not knowing that Jonah had done the same thing—then
slipped quietly from the house. Miles didn’t realize she’d left until Jonah got
back from the movies.

• • •

Charlie was in
the office until almost midnight. Like Miles, he was looking over the case file
and wondering what he was going to do.

It had taken
quite a bit of cajoling to cool Harvey down, especially after he threw in the
incident in Miles’s car as well. Not surprisingly, Thurman Jones remained
fairly quiet throughout it all. Charlie guessed that he thought it would be
better if Harvey did the talking for him. He did, however, flash the tiniest of
smiles when Harvey said that he was seriously considering bringing Miles up on
charges.

That was when
Charlie told them why Otis had been arrested in the first place.  Seemed that Miles hadn’t bothered to tell
Otis what the charge was. They were going to have a serious heart-to-heart the
following day—if Charlie didn’t wring his neck first.

But in the
presence of Harvey and Thurman, Charlie acted as if he’d known all along.

“No reason to
start flinging accusations when I wasn’t sure they were even warranted.”

As expected,
both Harvey and Thurman had problems with that. They had further problems with
Sims’s story, until Charlie told them he’d met with Earl Getlin.  “And he confirmed the whole thing” was how
he phrased it.  He wasn’t about to tell
Thurman about his doubts, nor was he willing to share them with Harvey just
yet. As soon as he’d finished, Harvey gave him a look that meant they should
meet later to talk in private. Charlie, knowing he needed more time to digest
things, pretended not to notice.

They did spend
a great deal of time talking about Miles after Charlie finished.  Charlie had no doubts that Miles had done
exactly what was described, and though he was . . .upset, to put it mildly,
he’d known Miles long enough to know that it wasn’t out of character in a
situation like this. But Charlie hid his anger, even as he kept his defense of
Miles to a minimum.

In the end,
Harvey recommended that Miles be placed on suspension for the time being, while
they sorted everything out.

Thurman Jones
asked that Otis either be released or charged right away, without further
delays.

Charlie told them
that Miles was already gone for the day, but that he would make a decision on
both counts first thing in the morning. 
Somehow, he hoped things would be clearer by then.

But they
wouldn’t be, as he discovered when he finally headed home.  Before he left the office, he got in touch
with Harris at his house, asking how it went.

Turned out he
hadn’t been able to find Sims all day.

“How hard did you
look?” Charlie snapped.

“I looked
everywhere,” Harris answered groggily. “His house, his mom’s place, his hangouts.
I went to every bar and liquor store in the county. He’s gone.”