When Snow Falls (21 page)

Cheyenne wasn’t sure she could live with what Presley had done, either. Or what
she’d
done to cover it up.

23

J
oe was in front of the station, talking to a customer about an oil change, when his father leaned out of the minimart. “Come in here when you’re done, will ya?”

Martin called him in all the time. Sometimes he had an idea for some way to improve the station. Or he thought they should hire or fire an employee, like the kleptomaniac Mindy they’d had to let go a couple of years ago. Joe wasn’t particularly concerned. After scheduling the oil change, he strolled inside. “What’s going on?”

Joyce Weatherby, a local schoolteacher, stood at the register, buying a pack of gum. Martin told her to have a good day and waited until she was gone before responding. “Have you heard the news?”

“What news?”

“Cheyenne lost her mother.”

Joe hadn’t been aware of that. He hadn’t called her yet. He’d been too caught up in making plans with his girls. He was supposed to pick them up in an hour and a half and keep them for a few days. “Who told you?”

“The hospice nurse stopped by to get gas a few minutes ago. She was on her way over with a hot meal for Cheyenne and Presley. She asked me to let anyone who might be friends with them know, so they could get some emotional support.”

“Have you called Gail?”

“No, but I will.”

He shoved his hands in his pockets. “So Anita’s finally gone.”

His father gave him a stern look.

“There’s no use pretending,” he said, and checked the time. His ex was expecting him at seven. Maybe he could talk Cheyenne into driving to Sacramento with him. He could take her and his girls to dinner while they were there. A night out just after her mother had died might not sound very appealing to Cheyenne, but with her friends in the Caribbean her alternative would probably be staying home—alone if Presley had to work. That couldn’t be much better.

Besides, he was curious to see how she’d interact with his children. It wasn’t like he could cancel his plans. His girls had asked a friend to change the date of her Christmas party so they’d be able to visit Whiskey Creek. The judge had assigned him Christmas Eve and Suzie Christmas Day.

“I’ll give Chey a call.”

His father was watching him a little too closely.

“What?”
he said.

“You like her, don’t you.”

He did. He liked her a lot. “Quit acting so smug,” he said, and his father chuckled as he walked away.

* * *

When Joe’s call came in, Cheyenne silenced her phone. She knew it was rude not to answer. It seemed like she’d been avoiding him all week. Gail tried calling next. But she couldn’t talk to either one of them right now. After several hours of searching without success, she was too panicked. She wanted to take a flashlight and comb the woods by the river. Presley loved it down there. During the summer she’d stand and wade in the water and smoke cigarette after cigarette.

Although it was too cold for that at Christmas, especially after dark, Cheyenne decided to go down there, anyway. But first she was hoping to enlist the support of the local police. She and Riley had contacted all of Presley’s friends and coworkers. She wasn’t sure what else she could do. Driving around, asking anyone and everyone about her sister wasn’t producing any results. Presley had left in the dead of night. Not many people in Whiskey Creek were up in the wee hours.

Riley waited in his Explorer as she knocked on Tim Stacy’s door. Tim hadn’t been the chief of police for more than a few years, but he’d worked for the four-man department as long as Cheyenne had lived in Whiskey Creek, so she’d seen him around. He’d once pulled Eve over when Cheyenne was with her, for accidentally running a red light.

When he answered the door, she could tell she’d interrupted his dinner.

“Sorry to bother you,” she said.

“No problem.” He wiped his mouth with a napkin he’d carried away from the table and glanced surreptitiously over her head, at Riley. “What can I do for you?”

He listened as she explained the situation, but as soon as she mentioned Presley’s name she could tell he was only being polite. By the time she reached the part about her sister taking off, and the fact that she hadn’t been seen all day, he was already discounting Cheyenne’s concern.

“It’s not even eight o’clock,” he said.

“But she left in the middle of last night. That means she’s been gone for fifteen hours or more.”

“
Hours?
Come on, you know your sister’s never been as…shall we say, stable as you have.”

“That may be true—”

“I’m sure she’s just trying to cope with her grief,” he broke in. “You’ve both been through a lot. The loss of a parent affects us all differently.”

“She’s never disappeared like this,” Cheyenne said, but that was desperation talking. She knew the second those words came out of her mouth that she’d lost all credibility. Presley had disappeared for
days
at a time. Once, she’d run away for weeks.

This situation was different, though. But only Cheyenne knew why.

No longer in uniform, he adjusted the belt that held up his jeans. “She’s got her car, right? She’ll come back when she’s ready.”

“What if she doesn’t?”

“If she’s not back in another day or so, we’ll see what we can do.”

“Day
or so?
” she echoed.

“I can’t use the city’s resources too quickly, Cheyenne. That wouldn’t be fair to the taxpayers, now would it—if I were to round up everyone and keep them out all night, on overtime, searching, only to find her drunk in some bar in Sacramento?”

Cheyenne’s heart sank. Once again, her sister’s reputation was working against her. Cheyenne had battled Anita’s irresponsibility all her life and now she was battling Presley’s.

Still, she made an effort to convince him. Riley even got out and said he thought something might really be wrong this time. But being gone for less than a full day wasn’t considered abnormal behavior, especially for a known drug user.

“I’m sorry,” Riley said as they walked back to his SUV.

Cheyenne was too angry to respond.

He opened the door for her. “What are you going to do?”

“I’m not giving up,” she said. “You can go home if you want, but I’m not giving up.”

“I don’t want to go home, Chey, but—” he grimaced “—I left Jacob at a friend’s. I need to get back there and collect him. I can leave him at my mom’s and come back later, though. I’ll do that, okay?”

Warm tears slid down her cheeks. She’d already taken his whole afternoon and most of the evening. But there wasn’t anyone else she could turn to.

“That’s okay,” she said. “Stay with Jacob. He’s off school and, for a change, not involved with sports and homework. And it’s almost Christmas. I don’t mind doing it alone.”

* * *

Aaron sat on one of the plastic chairs in the waiting room, drinking a Pepsi. Normally when he came in from the back, he got what he wanted and returned directly to the shop. He also left with the others at five o’clock, which he hadn’t done today. Dylan got the impression he was lingering because he had something to say.

“So…you really like Cheyenne, huh?”

That was it? He wanted to rub Dylan’s nose in what had happened last night?

Dylan finished the bite he’d taken of the sandwich Mack had brought him for dinner. He’d stayed at work because he was behind—and he thought it might help him forget Cheyenne. For the moment. “What’s on your mind?” he asked.

After downing half his soda, Aaron belched. “Didn’t I just tell you?”

“You don’t give a shit about my love life. And it’s got nothing to do with you, anyway. So is there something else we need to talk about?”

A strange look flickered over his brother’s face. Aaron seemed to struggle to come up with the right words. Then he muttered, “What the hell. Forget it,” and got up.

There was emotion in his voice beyond his usual petulance. It caught Dylan’s attention, brought him to his feet. “Aaron!”

He turned at the door and stared at him with hollow eyes, as if he couldn’t tolerate the pain that was eating him up inside.

“What is it?” Dylan asked, softening his voice.

Aaron’s throat worked as he swallowed. He seemed desperate to talk…and yet reluctant at the same time.

“Tell me,” Dylan prompted.

Rubbing his free hand over his face, he said, “I hate Dad.”

This wasn’t news. This was merely the warm-up. “Just Dad?”

He dropped his hand. “No. Mom, too.”

As the oldest, Dylan had known their mother best. He felt it was his duty to defend her and yet…what could he say? He felt as robbed as Aaron did. But, he tried, as usual. “She was mentally ill.”

Aaron lifted a hand. “Don’t feed me the bullshit you’ve been giving us ever since it happened. Far as I’m concerned, she took the easy way out. Bailed on us.” When Dylan didn’t react, Aaron’s hand shot out to punctuate his words. “Come on, you have to be angry with her, too! Look how much it changed
your
life.”

If only Aaron knew how angry Dylan had been. What did he think had fueled the rage driving Dylan at eighteen? Did he think Dylan
wanted
to get into the cage with some of those fighters? That he hadn’t been afraid of the experienced martial artists he’d had to go up against?

He’d done it because it was the one thing he could do to pay the bills when the shop wasn’t covering them all.

Rage had saved him, had made him an indomitable fighter. It’d helped that he’d had more at stake than his opponents. But the rage fueling him during those fights was mostly spent. Every once in a while, Dylan experienced a trace of it, enough to remind him what his emotional state had been like, but he’d learned to let go. Learned that he had to overcome the past or the past would overcome him. “Not anymore.”

Aaron’s jaw tightened. “How did you beat it back?”

Dylan often had difficulty stating how he felt, especially toward his brothers. He’d tried to show them with his actions, by the fact that he’d stayed when he could’ve taken off. But he wasn’t sure he’d ever actually told any of them he loved them. He’d kept a roof over their heads and food on the table, and he’d done what he could to keep them in line. That was more than J.T. had succeeded in doing once he started drinking so heavily. But Dylan had been absolutely inadequate at replacing their mother. They’d missed out on the gentleness and nurturing she could’ve provided. So Dylan forced himself to speak even though the emotion behind what he said made him uncomfortable, especially in front of Aaron. “I knew if I gave in to those negative emotions I’d lose you.”

His brother’s eyebrows jerked together. “You mean Mack.”

“I mean
all
of you. Do you think I’ve done what I’ve done just for him? If that was the case, two mouths would’ve been easier to feed than five.”

After hours, the office felt abnormally quiet. The workday was so loud and frenetic. But this silence seemed even more profound.

“I feel bad about Presley,” Aaron said at length.

So that was what had triggered this heart-to-heart. Dylan was relieved to know his brother had some reaction to what had happened besides his usual “I don’t give a shit.”

“So do I.” Dylan felt bad about Cheyenne, too, but he didn’t want to get his life tangled up with a woman who was always looking beyond him, always wanting something better. He figured he should steer clear of that emotional crash if he could. Lord knew he hadn’t avoided many other pitfalls.

“Where do you think she is?” Aaron bent his can as he turned it in his hand. “You don’t imagine…” He stopped talking the second his voice cracked.

Dylan felt a fresh burst of concern. “You’re really that worried about her? Why?”

“She’s gone, man!”

“But it hasn’t even been twenty-four hours. You know Presley. It’s not exactly unusual for her to take off. She might not surface for days.” What he’d seen in Anita’s room meant it wasn’t quite that simple. But Aaron wasn’t aware of that, and Dylan wasn’t about to reveal it. Especially because there was still a chance everything could end well. They hadn’t heard from her, didn’t know for sure what had happened.

Aaron shook his head. “I shouldn’t have let her go.”

“Wait a second.” God, Dylan wanted a cigarette. He hadn’t had one all day. But he was still trying to quit smoking, to prove to himself, if not Cheyenne, that he was every bit as good as Joe. “You told me you didn’t see her.”

Aaron’s bad attitude reasserted itself. “It was only for a minute.”

“But you said you didn’t see her!”

“I wasn’t completely honest with you, obviously.”

Son of a bitch.
“You didn’t have a fight....”

“No.”

“And you didn’t withhold any other information that might’ve helped us find her?”

“Of course not.”

“Then…what is it?”

His chin bumped his chest and Dylan’s heart began to race.
“Aaron?”

“When I wouldn’t go over to her place she hung up. But she stopped by later. I asked about her mother, but she wouldn’t give me a straight answer. She was too upset. She wanted to come in—started kissing me right there on the doorstep.”

“And?”

His speech slowed, but he continued. “I felt like shit. So I wasn’t interested. She asked me if I had any pills and…I gave her what I had and sent her home.”

The possibility of an overdose crossed Dylan’s mind, as it had before. Only now he had to worry that Aaron was responsible for it.
Shit…
“She didn’t go home.”

“No.” He raised his eyes. “But if I had any clue where she did go, I would’ve told you.”

Disgusted as well as concerned, Dylan rounded the reception desk. “What kind of pills did you give her?”

Clearly uncomfortable, Aaron stretched his neck. “I didn’t have any pills. I gave her crystal meth.”

“Where did you get it?”

“Come on, Dyl. It’s available, okay? I can get it if I want it. You can’t shut down every dealer I know. This is on me.”

“It better not be Carl.”

“It wasn’t Carl. He’s terrified of you. He freaks out every time I get near him.”

“Good.” But Aaron was right. Dylan couldn’t threaten every drug dealer in Northern California. If Aaron wanted to get high, he’d find a way. “Was Presley already stoned when she came over?”