Heartwood (Billy Bob Holland 2)

Jeff wore a Hawaiian shirt open on his chest. He slanted his head sideways and pushed the curls off his forehead with the tips of his fingers, studying my words with the idle concentration he might show a street beggar. Then he shook his head slowly as though he were bemused by a metaphysical absurdity and let his eyes wander out onto the swimming pool.

“Fletcher, go inside and call the sheriff’s office and find out what this is about,” Earl said.

“Should I show Mr. Holland to his car?” Fletcher asked.

“That’s a possibility,” Earl said.

“You know what you’ve let either this hired moron or your psychopath of a son do?” I said to Earl. “Skyler Doolittle had gotten Jessie Stump off your case. They were headed for Matagorda Bay, out of your life. But somebody murdered this harmless, gentle man with a .30-06 rifle while Jessie was shaving a few feet away. It looked like Jessie tried to stop the bleeding with his shirt. Skyler’s blood was smeared over everything in the area, which means Jessie probably tried to drag him out of the line of fire. That’s the man who’s probably up in your tree line now, Earl.”

Fletcher Grinnel set down the barbecue brush on a white plate and wiped his fingers with a paper towel and approached me, his lips pursed whimsically.

“No,” Peggy Jean said, and rose from her chair. She took me by the arm. “You walk with me, Billy Bob. This kind of thing is not going to happen at our house.”

She held my arm tightly, almost in a romantic fashion. Her breast touched my arm and her hip brushed against mine as we walked toward the front of the house. When we were around the corner of the building I felt the tension go out of her grip and I stepped away from her.

“You tried to warn Skyler. When this plays out in a courtroom, that’ll count for something,” I said.

“Whatever do you mean?”

“You left him a note on a pine branch outside the cave he and Stump were hidden in.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“He saw you picking blackberries on the creek. Why do you deny a good deed?”

“You listen, Billy Bob. My husband has gambled away or mismanaged or leveraged everything we own. After all the years I’ve spent on this marriage I’m not about to accept a life of genteel poverty in Deaf Smith. I’m bringing civil suit against Wilbur Pickett for the damage he’s done to us. Don’t you dare lie to me about the theft of those bonds, either. That man stole them and he’s going to pay for it.”

“Skyler Doolittle was murdered this morning, probably by a member of your household, and you’re talking about a civil suit?”

The blood climbed into her face.

“Maybe I’m a victim here, too. Did that ever occur to you?” she said.

“Yes, it did …”

“Then why do you treat me the way you do?” She stepped close to me and hit me in the chest with the flat of her fist, then again, desperately, her jawbone flexing. “We could have made it work. Why weren’t you willing to try?”

“Because you don’t love what we are, Peggy Jean. You’re in love with what we were.”

Her face crinkled high up on one cheek, like a flower held too close to heat. Then she turned and went into the house, her elbows cupped tightly in her palms, her back shaking.

Monday evening Ronnie Cruise turned off the road into my driveway and parked by the barn, out of view from the front. He was driving Cholo Ramirez’s ’49 Mercury, and an odor of burning rubber and oil rose from the tires and engine. Ronnie got out of the car and took off his shades and looked back down the drive at the road.

“What are you doing with Cholo’s car?” I said.

“I just got it out of the pound. Both our names were on the pink slip,” he said.

“Somebody after you, Ronnie?”

“I cruised Val’s. Some guys in a roll-bar rig followed me out. I got to sit down. I didn’t get no sleep last night.”

“What can I do for you?” I asked.

“I’m gonna save you a lot of time. My uncle, the guy who owns the auto shop where I work? He’s mobbed-up. Him and Cholo and some other guys, guys out of Galveston, were working the stick-up scam on Deitrich’s business friends. There’s this old skeet club between Conroe and Houston, except now it’s got water beds and chippies in it. Deitrich would steer his friends to the card game, then Cholo and the others would take it down. I got some guilt over this.”

“You said you weren’t involved with it.”

“You not understanding me. Yesterday I saw this dude Johnny Krause with my uncle. I asked my uncle, ‘Hey, what are you doing with this guy?’ He goes, ‘Johnny was one of the take-down artists on the last job at the skeet club.’ I go, ‘That’s the guy who killed Cholo.’