Dorothy Garlock - [Dolan Brothers] (36 page)

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“And the girls lined up, I bet.”
“Woop! There’s our friend Webb!” Johnny removed his arm and opened the truck door at the same time. “Stay here,” he said urgently.
Three men had come around from the back of the building and stopped to pass around a bottle. They didn’t see Johnny until the last one had put a cap on it and shoved it in his pocket.
“Wait right here, Webb,” Johnny said sharply. “You fellows go on in. I want a word with Webb.”
“I ain’t got nothin’ to say to you. The sheriff knows I’m here.” Webb attempted to follow his friends into the tavern. Johnny grabbed his arm and threw him up against the side of the building. “Hey, ya got no call to do that.”
“Go on in, boys,” Johnny said again. “My beef is with Webb.”
“Don’t go,” Webb whined. “He’s gonna beat me up.”
The men shrugged and disappeared inside the tavern.
“Gimme my belt buckle,” Johnny demanded. “Give it to me or I’ll beat the hell out of you.”
“What the shit ya talkin’ about? I ain’t got yore goddamn belt buckle.”
“Clara Ramsey had it. It wasn’t on her when she was found, so I figure the last man with her has it. I mean to get it back.” Johnny held Webb up against the wall and drew back his fist.
“Hell, man. ’Twasn’t me. I come outside with her. She was only chargin’ four bits.”
“You screwed her out here?”
“Didn’t even get ’er to the car. We was ’bout to get in when she spied a big fancy car and let out a squeal. I had my whacker out, ready to do business, when she run off and got in the fancy car. Damn bitch took my four bits and I got nothin’.”
“Tell me about the car, Webb. So far you’re my best bet. If you’ve sold that buckle, I’m going to choke the life out of you.” Johnny fastened a hand around Webb’s neck and bounced his head against the wall of the tavern.
“I told ya. I ain’t got yore buckle.”
“The car? What kind was it?”
“I ain’t knowin’ what kind. It was big and black . . . had lots . . . of shiny on it. Stop it! Yo’re hurtin’—”
“What else . . . out with it. I don’t think there was a car,” Johnny said angrily.
“I swear it, Johnny. It kind of sloped down in the back. I saw it when it . . . went by and it had a big old thingamabob for a radiator cap.”
“Had you seen it before?”
“I . . . don’t think so. I swear to God, Johnny. I don’t have your buckle. If that twister tail had it, she sure didn’t give it to me.”
“Why didn’t you go to the sheriff and tell him Clara was with a man in a big car the night she was killed?”
“I ain’t tellin’ that sheriff nothin’. The deputy told me ’n Krome to lay low. It’s what we been doin’.”
Johnny let up on Webb’s throat. “Don’t tell a soul what you told me, or I’ll be back, and there’ll not be enough of you left to tell a tale about.”
“What’a ya gonna do now?”
“Find that guy in the big car and get my buckle back. Go on in and keep your trap shut.”
Johnny waited until Webb was inside the tavern before he went back to the truck.

 

Chapter Twenty-two
J
ohnny hurried back to the truck. He reached for Kathleen as soon as he closed the door and hugged her tightly.
“You brought me luck, sweet Kathleen,” he murmured against her cheek. “You’re my lucky charm! I know who Clara was with. I’m almost sure I know who killed her, but I don’t know how we’re going to prove it.” He was clearly elated.
“Oh, Johnny. How in the world did you find that out?” She was being held tightly against him, happy to be sharing this moment with him. “Who was it?”
“Webb told me that she got into a big black car. I’m sure it was Marty Conroy’s, the little jelly bean who was with her at the rodeo. She must have really made him mad, or else she was threatening him with something, and he had to get rid of her. He’s usually a spineless blowhard.”
“Did Webb see him?”
“No, just the car. He told me about coming outside with Clara. They were going to his car when she saw the car sitting back down the road. She ran to it and got in. Webb was—” Johnny began to laugh. “I can’t tell you the rest.”
“Why not? I’m a big girl.”
“He paid for something he didn’t get.”
“Uh-oh. Say no more.”
Johnny then told her the story that he had spun about Clara taking the belt buckle he had won along with the prize money at the rodeo and about him looking for someone she might have given it to.
Kathleen reared back to look at him. “Johnny Henry! You are devious! But . . . that was a brilliant idea. Wait a minute. How did you tell them she got it in the first place?” She framed his face with the palms of her hands.
“I didn’t tell them; I let them use their imaginations.”
“You didn’t! The story will be all over town.”
“Webb will be too scared to tell. The cowboys will think that they know something no one else knows and will keep it to themselves.”
“Where do we go from here?”
“I’m not sure. I’ve got to talk to Keith. He knows Marty better than anyone. We’re not going to have real proof. We’ll have to get him to admit that he did it.”
“Does that mean you’ll make another trip down to the McCabe ranch?”
“I’ll go down tomorrow. I want to stay on this while it’s hot. Want to come along?”
“I can’t go tomorrow.” She sat back and looked at him.
Oh, Lord! How is he going to take this?
“Okay. I just thought you might want to go.”
“I do want to go, but . . . Johnny there is something else going on in this town. Something very wrong. Adelaide and I are trying to get someone to look into it.”
“You don’t have to give me an excuse.”
“I’m not giving you an excuse. It’s a matter of conscience. I’m obligated to do this other thing. I haven’t told you what Adelaide and I suspect because we had nothing really to go on until Judy DeBerry, a young girl from Fort Worth, came to town looking for her real mother. I went to the courthouse and looked at the birth records. And, Johnny, you won’t believe how many babies are born in this town.”
Please, darling, don’t be mad and ruin this special time I’ve had with you.
Kathleen talked steadily for five or more minutes, telling about meeting Judy, her reception at the courthouse, the deputy trying to take her notebook, and Judge Fimbres’s interference. The more words tumbled from her, the faster they came, and the more she feared that she would never be able to find the right ones to tell him that she had asked the man that he’d turned his back on to help them. She closed her eyes briefly before she told him.
“We decided that we needed someone who had some credibility with not only Judge Fimbres, but with the district attorney’s office in Oklahoma City. We decided to ask Barker Fleming to help us. He will be here tomorrow.” She finished the last few words in a rush.
Her last words cut into Johnny like a knife.
The son of a bitch is going through Kathleen to get to me. A hell of a lot of good it will do him.
With his eyes on her face, Johnny retreated to the safety of silence. Tension was alive between them.
“Johnny, Paul, and Adelaide agreed that we must do something. Please come and help us.” Her lovely blue eyes were clouded with worry. “We think that over the years there could be as many as two hundred babies sold out of that clinic.”
He realized that he didn’t dare linger in silence for too long or he might lose the will to break it at all. He’d start the truck and take her home without a word. Should that happen, it would be the end of his ever being with her again.
“Did you call him?”
“Yes. We needed someone who is not under Doc Herman’s thumb to investigate him.” Her hand shook when she pushed hair back from her face.
“Why bring
him
in?”
“Because he owns the tannery. He has an interest in the town. You don’t have to like him or have anything to do with him, Johnny. Just tolerate him for the sake of the girls like Judy, who was sold to people who hated her when she began to show her Indian blood and threw her out on the street to fend for herself.”
“I thought I made it plain to you that I don’t want anything to do with him.”
“I need . . . you to . . . be with me on this. Help me. Please, Johnny. I can’t do it without you.” Her voice came through quivering lips. Her eyes were bright with tears; her hands clutched at his shirt as if she was drowning.
“Don’t cry,” he said harshly.
“I can’t help it. This is terribly important to me.”
“Who? Fleming or Dr. Herman?” he asked harshly.
“You! You, idiot!” she said tersely. “I’m twenty-six years old. I’m not a silly girl with a crush, for Christ sake! It’s stupid of me to tell you this, but where you’re concerned I seem to have lost my pride. You’ve become very important to me. I . . . might be . . . in love with you.”
He was silent. She was beginning to regret her words when he gritted out angrily.
“Don’t play with me, Kathleen.”
“Don’t play with you? Sheesh! Are you so blind that you can’t see what’s right under your nose? Are you afraid that I’ll chase after you like Clara did? I have pride, too. If you don’t want me, all you have to do is start up this truck and take me home.”
“I
am
afraid . . . but not that you’ll chase me.”
“You couldn’t possibly be afraid of me,” she said tiredly.
“If you want to know the God’s truth, I’m scared to death of you.”
“I don’t understand you at all. Why are you warm and wonderful some of the time and at other times as cold as ice?”
He grabbed her forearms and jerked her to him. Tears had run down her cheeks and stopped at the corners of her mouth. The zigzagging neon lights on the front of the tavern were reflected in her eyes.
“I know I can’t have you, and it’s tearing me up,” he snarled. “I’m only trying to protect myself, dammit to hell!”
“From me?”
“And from myself. Oh, Lord! Don’t cry.”
“I’m trying not to. Are you married? Is that why you—?”
“—Hell, no, I’m not married.”
“Are you . . . in love with someone?” Her voice was a mere whisper.
“I
think
I am.” He pulled her tight against him. With his face buried in the curve of her neck, he said, “I
know
I am, and it’s hell. I wish you were a waitress at the Frontier Cafe, a ticket-seller at the theater, or a girl from one of the ranches around.”
Kathleen pulled back from him. She was trembling and wildly flushed. A corner of her mind believed that he was saying he loved her. Then—
“Why do you say that? What’s wrong with me?” She put her hand on his chest and held herself away from him.
“Nothing is wrong with you. You’re the smartest, prettiest, spunkiest, most wonderful woman I’ve ever met. There’s plenty wrong with me.”
“What’s wrong with you? You’re a man with principles. You’re kind and compassionate, proud and independent. You cared about a girl like Clara and tried to help her. Johnny”—she put her hands on his shoulders and spoke earnestly—“you’ve got all the qualities I ever hoped to find in the man I’d share my life with.”
“Aunt Dozie used to say that ‘birds of a feather flock together.’ You’re a beautiful redbird, Kathleen. I’m just a crow.”
“I heard what that Marty person said that day about your mother. Mr. Fleming also told me. He made no excuses for himself for what he did. He only wants to make it right now. Do you think that I’m such a shallow person that I’d care who your parents were?”
“It’s not only that. I only went to the fifth grade in school,” he said, and the words almost choked him. “When I went to live with Henry Ann and Ed, I was ashamed to go to school because I was so far behind. That’s one of the reasons why I’m not with the Federal Bureau. I’d never pass a test. Hell, I’ve never even read a book, and you
write
them.”
“—Thomas Edison only had three months of formal schooling.”
“I have a rag-tail ranch with a big mortgage,” he continued, determined to say it all. “I could lose it lock, stock, and barrel by next year. I’ve nothing to offer a woman, especially a woman like you.”
“You’ve got yourself, Johnny. We could be a team. What I lack, you make up. What you lack, I make up.” In desperation, Kathleen wrapped her arms about his neck and held him tightly. “If you care for me at all, give us a chance. Don’t throw it away before we give it a try. We may regret it for the rest of our lives.”
He kissed her softly, sweetly, to close her mouth. His lips then roamed over her tear-wet face, and returned to hers again and again, hard, demanding. His fingers forked through her hair to cradle her head, while other fingers grasped her hips, pulled her closer, then moved up to caress her soft, round breasts.

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