Kansas Troubles (36 page)

“You killed her?” I said.

“Give the woman a kewpie doll.”

“But why?”

“Why? She sold my child, that’s why. She sold my daughter like a steer on the hoof. What kind of woman does that? What kind of
mother
does that?” He looked at us, his face truly perplexed, waiting for an answer.

“She didn’t deserve to die for it,” I couldn’t help saying. “Why did you have to kill her?”

He picked up the bottle and drank again, his face sad. “I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t help it. It was
her
own fault. She wouldn’t tell me where my daughter was. I’d been begging her for weeks. There was no way, she said, that I’d ever find her. If she’d just told me where my little girl was, everything would have been okay.” The hand holding the pistol hung loosely at his side. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw an almost imperceptible tightening of Gabe’s body. I attempted to keep Dewey talking.

“You met at the Miller Cafe, didn’t you?”

He nodded. My stomach dropped when he tightened his grip on the pistol. His face grew liquid with memory.

“She was so pretty,” he said. “And so innocent. I met her six years ago.” He shook his head. “I can’t believe it’s been that long. She wasn’t married then.” He inhaled raggedly, and the skin around his eyes tightened. “She didn’t want to marry that Amish guy, but she’d put him off, put her father off, as long as she could. I tried to get her to leave before, but she was too afraid. It killed me thinking he was with her.”

“Did she continue working at the cafe after she was married?” I prompted.

“No, good little Amish women stay home and take care of their husbands and have babies. For a year the only time I saw her was when she dropped off the cherry and apple cobblers she and her sister baked for the cafe. I always knew the exact time she’d be there, and I waited for her. We planned her escape with snatches of conversation in the parking lot.” He regarded me for a long moment. “I paid for her first pair of jeans. For her first guitar. And how does she repay me? She sells my daughter.”

“Did she say why?” I asked softly.

His eyes turned hard. “She said she didn’t have time for a baby. That it wasn’t in her plans. That it would trap her.” He mimicked her voice as he spoke the last sentence. A shudder ran down my spine. His voice dropped back to his own rough timbre. “I said I’d take our daughter. She wouldn’t have to do a thing. She said it didn’t work like that, that she wouldn’t be able to stay away if she knew where she was. That it would be too much of a temptation.” He shook his head. “Shit, I know how to pick ’em, don’t I, Gabe?”

“How did you know the child was even yours?” I asked, taking a chance on angering him, but trying to buy Gabe and me some time.

He laughed bitterly. “I can add. When she first left her family, I was the only friend she had. We were together a few months, and then she just up and disappeared. I thought I’d go crazy. No calls, no letters. I looked everywhere. Then DeeDee was killed, and Belinda and I broke up . . . it was a bad time.”

“So you were with her when you were still with Belinda. No one ever knew you and Tyler had a relationship.” That explained why he was never a strong suspect.

He laughed. “She
is
a smart one, Gabe. A real asset to your career, I’ll just bet.” He shook his head. “Or a big pain in the ass.”

“What about the brick?” I asked. “Where did you hide it?”

“Oldest trick in the book. I simply put it in the trunk of my car. By the time they’d figured out that was what killed her, it was at the bottom of the Arkansas River. Besides, these guys were my buddies. They would never have even considered searching
my
car.”

“How did you find out about the baby? She hid it pretty well.”

“Well, now, that’s the problem with having musicians for friends. They aren’t always the most trustworthy people around. T.K. got drunk one night, and he and Cordie June got to talking. She was complaining that she was flat broke, and he said there was an easy way to make ten grand if she didn’t mind being inconvenienced for about nine months. Said he’d be glad to be the ‘donor’ if she’d pay him a ten percent stud fee. Then he told her about this good friend of his who sold her baby to some desperate couple who wanted themselves a healthy white baby. She told me about it one night in bed, and I put two and two together. Gabe’ll tell you, I’m a pretty good detective when I want to be.” He pushed his hat back and grinned proudly. Then the grin faded, and he took another quick sip from the bottle. “Now, enough of this crap.”

“Dewey, you can’t do this,” I said. “Please.”

“I don’t have any other choice. It was an accident, her dying like that, but I couldn’t help it. She shouldn’t have kept my little girl from me.”

I swallowed hard, so angry I wanted to scream. It was unbelievable. He actually thought what he did was justified. But I grabbed onto it. Keep him talking, a voice inside me said. Every minute is one Gabe can use to his advantage. I sent Gabe a mental message: You’d better do something quick, Friday, the soles of my tap shoes are getting paper-thin here.

“Then tell the detectives that,” I said, lowering my voice to a soft, imploring tone. “They’ll understand. You couldn’t help it. Something can be worked out. I’m sure that if you’d just talk to the detectives, tell them your side of the story . . .”

His face darkened. “Shut up!” He swung the pistol up and pointed it at me. Gabe jumped up. Dewey grabbed me around the neck and stuck the pistol under my chin. “Don’t even think about it, old friend.” Gabe froze, his face drained of color.

The barrel of the gun was cold and hard against the soft flesh under my chin. My insides turned to water. I wondered briefly how long the pain would last. Please, Lord, I prayed. Don’t let Gabe watch me die. Don’t let his last minutes on earth be so agonizing.

Dewey loosened his grip on me, then turned the gun on Gabe. I could see Gabe visibly let out the breath he’d been holding. “Nice try, Benni, but I’m not stupid. We all know I’ll get hung out to dry on this one. The media will just eat it up. Cop kills mother of child because she sold it to the highest bidder. I just hate what this will do to Chet. That’s why it would be better if I leave. He’s my family. I have to protect him.”

“You can’t,” I whispered. “Dewey . . .”

“Like I said, I don’t have a choice. You both know too much. I need to buy myself some time.” He drank from the bottle again.

“No.” Gabe’s voice was deep, commanding. We both looked over at him in surprise. It was the first time he’d spoken since I walked in.

“What?” Dewey asked.

“You owe me,” Gabe said, enunciating each word slowly, carefully. His eyes never left Dewey’s face.

Dewey contemplated Gabe for a long moment. “I always wondered if you’d ever cash in on that. You’re right, I do owe you. An eye for an eye, so to speak. One life. I owe you
one
life.”

“Gabe, no . . .” I started.

“Let her go,” Gabe answered.

Dewey smiled sadly. “I hate doing this. You know it. But they’ll fry me.” He turned and looked at me. “You do present a problem, young lady. Just how am I going to keep you from siccing the good guys on me before I reach Mexico?”

“Don’t do this, Dewey,” I said in one last desperate attempt to appeal to whatever good there was in him. “It’s wrong. Think of Chet, what this’ll do to him. Think of—”

“Shut up!” he snapped. “I’ve thought of that. That’s why I’m leaving. It’ll be better for him than a long, ugly trial. This is the only way.”

“No, Dewey, it’s not. We’ll get you the best lawyer, we’ll stick by you, we’ll—”

He grabbed my upper arm, his fingers biting deep into my skin. “I said, shut up.”

Gabe started toward us. Dewey’s face twisted into a harsh, ugly expression. He pointed the gun at Gabe’s chest and said one word: “Don’t.” In that instant I saw the man who had killed Tyler in raw anger simply because she wouldn’t give him what he wanted. Little girl, I said, sending a mental message to his and Tyler’s daughter, wherever you are, count your lucky stars he’ll never be your daddy.

In those brief seconds, watching him aim the gun at my husband, knowing what he planned, I suddenly realized something about myself. That if I could, I would rip that gun from his hands and kill him. As simple as that. I would do it in a second, without regret. Maybe later, when I had a chance to think about it, the horror of my choice would tear at me and change me in ways I never thought possible. But I knew, in that moment, I could do it. To save Gabe, I not only could do it, but wanted to. And that thought chilled me to the deepest part of my soul. What Gabe’s philosopher said was true—what we fear most isn’t being killed, but killing, because only then do we understand the ugliness of our true natures. How each of us is, without God’s grace, utterly and entirely capable of murder.

“Sit down,” he commanded Gabe.

Gabe slowly backed up and sank down into the chair, his face for the first time showing just a shadow of tension. “Dewey, you need to quit drinking,” he said in an amazingly calm voice. “If you’re going to pull this off, you’ll need all your wits about you. Remember Nam. If you get too stoned, they always get you. Remember.”

Dewey scratched his cheek with the barrel of the gun, loosening his grip on my arm. “You’re right, Gabe. Man, you’re right. I really hate doin’ this to you, buddy, but there isn’t any other way. It’s exactly like Nam, all right. It’s a war, man. Life is a war. And us good guys are losing.”

“I know,” Gabe said, his voice smooth and soothing. He held out his hand, palm up. “Listen to me, and I’ll help you. If you promise you won’t hurt Benni, I’ll help you.”

He looked at Gabe, his face relaxing. “You always were better at getting us out of sticky situations.” He gave him a beseeching look. “I don’t want to hurt her, buddy, and I know I owe you, but what can I do?”

“Take her with you,” Gabe said.

“Gabe!” I protested.

He looked directly at me for the first time since I came in. His eyes were hard and cold. His cop eyes. “Benni, stay out of this.”

“After you kill me,” Gabe continued, his voice as even and cool as if he were telling Dewey how to change a spark plug, “take the Camaro and drive to Mexico. Release Benni when you reach the border. Just make sure she has some money and you leave her in a place where she can safely call for someone to come get her. Then your debt’s paid.”

Dewey contemplated Gabe’s plan. “How do I get her out to the car without her making a fuss?”

I looked over at Gabe, throwing him a furious look. What kind of plan was this? “I won’t go,” I said. “I’ll scream. Belinda’s out there, other people are out there. They’ll hear me. I won’t let him get away with this. I won’t let him kill you.”

“Benni,
shut up
.” Gabe’s harsh words shocked me into silence.

Dewey frowned. “She’s right, I’ll never get her out there without her making a fuss unless I knock her out.” He looked at the butt of his gun.

“No,” Gabe said quickly. “She could get a concussion. I don’t want her hurt.” He nodded at the half empty bottle of bourbon. “Get her drunk, then tie her up and put her in the back seat. Cover her with a blanket. She never drinks, so I doubt that she can hold her liquor, and she’s small. It won’t take much.”

“Gabe!” My voice was frantic now.

“It could work,” Dewey mused, nodding his head. He picked up the bottle and handed it to me. “Drink.”

I crossed my arms over my chest. “No.”

He looked over at Gabe and shrugged. “Looks like we’re stuck with plan B. I tried, old buddy.”

“Benni, look at me.” Gabe’s voice was firm. I looked into his taut face, into his chameleon eyes, dark gray now from anxiety, and realized this might be the last time we ever saw each other. “Do what he says.”

“I can’t.” My voice was thick; tears blurred my vision. “I can’t lose you. Please, Gabe.”

“You can,” he said gently. “You can do it for me. Now drink.”

Keeping my eyes on his face, I brought the bottle to my mouth and took a drink. It felt like a hot branding iron being shoved down my throat. I doubled over, coughing and gasping for breath.

“More,” Dewey said, prodding me with his gun. I tilted the bottle back slightly. He pushed it higher and held it, forcing the bourbon to flow faster into me.

“Stop,” I said, jerking my head away. A river of whiskey ran down my cheek. “I can’t breathe.”

For the next ten minutes, with Gabe watching, his eyes full of pain, Dewey made me drink. I felt the effects of the liquor almost immediately. The edges around my eyes blurred, and everything sounded muted, like I was struggling through miles of a dense fog.

Dewey leaned against the wall next to me and talked as I drank, asking questions that, after a few drinks, I had trouble answering coherently.

“How did you figure out it was me?” he asked, screwing a silencer to the end of his pistol. My stomach felt heated and full from the bourbon. I knew what was going to happen and I wanted to do something, but I just couldn’t get my arms and legs coordinated to do it.

“The quilt,” I said, reaching for the arm of the chair. “I have to sit down or I’m going to fall.”

“The quilt? How’d you tie me to that stupid quilt?”

“The pattern. Arkansas Traveler.” A big heated wave crashed in my stomach. “It’s also called Cowboy Star. She did it to remember you.”

His head jerked up at my words. “Why would she do that?”

I looked at his confused face. Why
would
she want to remember him? Then I realized she made the quilt before all the bad feelings happened between them. He’d been the first friend in her new life, maybe the first man she ever loved. Would he have left Belinda to marry her? And would she have wanted him to? Tyler had apparently loved Dewey, but she loved her music more. Even more than she loved her own child. But with her background, abortion would have been unthinkable. So she went to her only other friend, T.K., and had the baby and gave it—sold it—to a couple who would give it the kind of home she obviously felt she couldn’t. She probably still had feelings for Dewey while his child grew in her, and she wanted some tangible thing with which to remember both him and his child.