Софи Келли - A Night's Tail

“Hell yeah,” he said. “Three, maybe four weeks ago he called me outta nowhere. I hadn’t talked to him in had to be ten years.”

“So he just wanted to catch up?” I said.

“Nah, it was more than that. There was a kid that was in one of our classes—Lew and I were taking it for the second time because we hadn’t really applied ourselves the first time.” He laughed. “Anyways, this kid—he wasn’t really a buddy, more a hanger-on if you know what I mean—his name was Carroll. Who the heck gives their kid a name like that anyway?”

I didn’t think Parker was expecting an answer so I didn’t comment.

“So Lew asked if I’d go see the guy’s kid play, see if he was any good. I asked him why he wanted to do a favor for Christmas and his kid.”

“Excuse me?” Had I heard him correctly? “Christmas?”

“Yeah. Lew always called the kid that because his name was Carroll. Get it? Christmas Carroll.”

“I get it,” I said.

Christmas. I had heard Wallace say that word when we were at The Brick that first night. I shook my head, trying to make all the pieces fall into place.

“So was he any good?” I asked.

“Yeah,” Parker said. “I think we’re gonna recruit him.”

All roads led back to Saint Edwin’s. “Do you remember Christmas’s last name?”

He laughed. “Not a chance. I did a lot of partying back then. There’s whole months I can’t remember. Sorry. And the kid uses his mother’s last name. Her and Christmas were never married.”

“Do you happen to have any photos of . . . Christmas?”

“Probably.” His voice boomed through the phone. It was a lot like talking to a big affable dog. “But I don’t have a clue where they’d be.”

I sighed. This wasn’t going to work. “Thanks for talking to me,” I said.

“You’re welcome,” he said. “I was sorry to hear about Lew, you know.”

He was the first person to say that, I realized.

“Hey, you know, if you want to find a photo of Christmas you could try the school’s website. They’ve got pictures going back for years for the football team. You should be able to find Christmas. He was one of the team’s trainers.”

I thanked him and said good night. Then I reached for my computer.

Saint Edwin’s may have been a small school but they’d had eleven members of their football team play professionally in the last twenty-five years, I learned from their website. I scrolled through the photos looking for the years that Lewis Wallace and Chunk Parker had been at the college.

It was in the team photo from their second year that I found what I was looking for. I stared at the computer screen, not trusting what I was seeing. For a moment I forgot to breathe. My eyes were playing tricks on me. It was the only explanation.

I moved over closer to the lamp on the nightstand for more light. I had to be wrong. I needed to be wrong.

I wasn’t wrong. Just like that, I knew who had killed Lewis Wallace. The pieces fell into place like a puzzle I was looking at from another perspective.

Hercules had wandered into the room when I wasn’t looking. He sat beside me now, eyes on the computer screen, and then cocked his head to one side.

“But how?” I said.

I looked at my old clock radio next to the lamp on the nightstand. I rarely used it because Hercules and his brother were pretty good about waking me long before I needed to get up, just the way Owen had that morning.

Time. That was it.

I sat there without moving, without speaking, sorting all the facts until they made a pattern. A pattern that said that I was right: There was only one possible killer.

I made one quick phone call. I only had one question to ask. Once I heard the answer I knew the how. And I was reasonably sure I also knew the why.

I ended the phone call and just sat there for a minute. Then I shut down the computer. I set it on the floor in front of the night table, precisely aligning it in the center between the two front legs of the stand. I picked up a bit of lint from the carpet. I buffed a fingerprint from the screen of my cell phone.

Hercules watched without comment. Finally, he climbed onto my lap and put one paw on my chest. I buried my face in his fur, and I cried.

chapter 16

After a minute or so I kissed the top of Hercules’s head, got up and went to wash my face. Then I changed my pajama pants for jeans, gave my hair a brush and headed downstairs, Hercules beside me.

The guys were sitting at the kitchen table going over their set list, talking about which songs to keep and which to replace. There was a large pizza box on the table with a couple of slices left. Owen was sitting next to Ethan’s chair.

“Hey, Kath, did you change your mind about the pizza?” Ethan asked, gesturing at the box. Milo and Derek both nodded hello.

I shook my head. “No.” There was no way I could ever swallow past the lump in my throat.

I studied Ethan, hair wild as usual, gesturing with the pencil he was holding. He had such strong feelings about everything and for better or worse he brought that passion to everything he did. I remembered him as a baby and how quickly I came to love him and Sara with all that I had.

Owen walked around the table to me and I bent and picked him up, which gave me, somehow, a tiny shot of courage. He nuzzled my chin, Hercules leaned against my leg and I leaned against the counter.

Ethan looked across the table at Derek and then grinned at me. “Guess what?” he said. “Derek’s going to join the band. I mean for good.”

My stomach clutched.

Derek ran his fingers through his two-day-old beard. “I’m thinking I may have to get some dye for this,” he said.

“Then you could pretend you’re Liam’s older brother instead of his dad,” Milo joked.

“Derek, where is your son is going to school?” I asked.

He glanced over at me. “He hasn’t decided yet. He’s waiting to see how many offers he gets.”

The lump at the back of my throat wouldn’t go away. “But you’re pulling for him to go to Saint Edwin’s. It’s kind of your alma mater.”

“Derek didn’t go to college, Kath,” Ethan said without even glancing up from the sheet of paper in front of him. “Remember?”

“Derek didn’t finish college,” I said.

Ethan frowned, finally looking up at me. “No. He didn’t go in the first place, and what are you, the education police all of a sudden?”

“No one else would accept you, would they?” I said, keeping my eyes on Derek. If I looked at Ethan I’d start to cry again.

Ethan’s dark eyes flashed. His expression was both angry and puzzled. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Kathleen, but knock it off. Why don’t you eat something? Maybe your blood sugar is low.”

“How did you know?” Derek asked.

I knew those words were directed at me.

“I saw an old team photo of you standing in front of Lewis Wallace.”

Ethan jumped to his feet, the chair scraping on the floor. “Derek didn’t know that jerk, so will you please tell me what the hell is going on?”

I saw the realization dawn across Milo’s face. “Stop talking,” he said. He pushed his chair back and got to his feet as well. Ethan opened his mouth to say something and Milo put both hands on his chest and pushed him back into his seat. “Stop, just stop, okay?”

I think it was the first time I’d ever heard Milo raise his voice, even a little.

“Did you know he was going to be in town?” I asked Derek. I could see Ethan out of the corner of my eye, perched on the edge of his seat. I couldn’t look directly at him because I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to keep going.

“I found out he was maybe going to set up his new business here. When Ethan told me you lived here it just seemed like things were finally going to go my way.”