Steven Havill - Bitter Recoil

“Some different laws apply,” I said gently.

He nodded sad agreement with that. “The girl living with Finn is my daughter.”

“And Cecilia’s?” I prompted.

“Yes,” Father Nolan Parris said. He looked relieved.

Over the years, I’ve had lots of practice at not looking as surprised as I felt. This was one of those times. I leaned back in the chair and regarded Parris with interest. Then, trying to sound fatherly instead of intimidating, I said, “So tell me.”

He shrugged. “It’s no long story. As I said, Cecilia’s brother was a close friend of mine. My best friend. We’d known each other since we were two. We went to school together, all the way from kindergarten through college and seminary.” He stopped, arranging his mental cards.

“I wish some of his willpower and discipline had rubbed off on me. I drink too much, Sheriff. Or at least, I did.” He clasped his hands tightly together. “I guess that I was an alcoholic by the time Richard Burgess was killed. That’s what they tell me. Anyway, his death…the stupidity of it…the waste…was all the excuse I needed.

“I don’t remember all the grim details, and I don’t think I ever want to. The next eighteen months were my own private hell. They say a drunk has to hit rock bottom before he’ll admit to being in trouble.” He shook his head. “Do you know where they found me, finally?”

I shook my head and Parris said, “I was living in a cardboard box under an Albuquerque overpass-downtown, where the old railroad station used to be. And living is probably the wrong word. A rookie cop happened by and he thought I was dead. Next best thing. They took me to St. Joseph’s, and one of the nurses recognized me…she remembered when Richard Burgess and I hung out together. We used to be on rotation together as police department chaplains. Los dos padres , they called us. But that was a long time ago.” He hesitated, lost in his memories. My back hurt from sitting so long.

“I didn’t have any close relatives. Just one cousin back east somewhere. The nurse knew about Cecilia Burgess and called her. That was the big mistake, I guess. That’s when it started. I held onto her like a damn leech. I guess I put her through more hell than even last night.”

“I doubt that.”

“Anyway, one thing led to another. I was an accomplished liar. Always have been. I could lie to myself as easily as to anyone else. I made up some of the most wonderfully creative stories…personal sob stories that suckered that poor girl right into my world. I guess it was one of those nights when she was trying to keep me from tearing the apartment apart…that’s when we started.”

“You had sex with her, you mean?”

“Stripped of all the niceties and excuses, that’s the gist of it.”

“And that guilt really set you off?”

Nolan Parris looked up sharply at my tone. He moved his jaw sideways, assessing me. “Maybe you don’t understand, Sheriff. You impress me as the kind of man who’s always known exactly where he stood, who always knows exactly what he believes.”

“I’ve had my moments. Anyone does. But that’s not what’s at issue now. I gather the two of you didn’t stay together long?”

“No. I can remember having long discussions with her about my leaving the clergy, after finding out she was pregnant. But I…I just couldn’t.”

“Why not?”

Again Parris looked at me critically, but he wasn’t in a hurry to answer. To let him off the hook a little I asked, “How did the two of you end up here, in San Estevan?”

“She took some courses at the university, and one of them involved a field trip to the mountains around here…geology, I think it was. She fell in love with the village and had dreams of raising Daisy here, away from the city.”

“Daisy’s the girl’s name?”

“Yes.”

“When did Cecilia move up here?”

“About a year ago.”

“And you?”

“Me? I received the ultimatum from my bishop last August. Dry out or get out.” Parris smiled faintly. “Bishop Sanchez didn’t use those exact words.” He shrugged. “I’ve been here ever since. I could have left long before, but I’m serving as a resident counselor.”

“And you’ve stayed dry?”

Parris nodded slightly. There wasn’t any pride in his voice when he said, “Dry.”

“Good for you. Even today?”

He covered his face with two smooth hands and then cupped them under his chin. “Even today. Falling off the wagon wouldn’t have done Cecilia any tribute.”

How noble, I thought. “What’s Daisy doing up at the hot springs with Finn?”

I couldn’t imagine leaving a kid of mine on the mountain with a long-haired freak while her mother expired in a hospital a hundred miles away…even if I were a priest and inordinately sensitive about appearances.

Parris’s face hardened, and I noticed the tick in his cheek again. “You have to understand, Sheriff, that even though we live in the same village, Cecilia and I see little of each other. We saw little of each other. For very obvious reasons.” He stopped in case I had to ask what the reasons were. I didn’t. “And she had been living with Finn, off and on. And was to have his child.” He held up his hands helplessly. “Now you have to believe I was going to-”

We were interrupted by the sound of a powerful car’s engine as the vehicle slowed and then lunged down into the retreat’s driveway. The flash of headlights stabbed through the window and then I saw the wink of blue and red.

“What the hell…” I said, rising to my feet. I peered out through the window and saw Estelle Reyes-Guzman’s county car as it nearly climbed the steps. “Excuse me.” I yanked the parlor door open, then the front door, and met Estelle just as she reached the porch.

She immediately turned around and headed back for the car, saying over her shoulder, “Come on, we need to get up the canyon.”

I turned to Parris, who’d limped to the door and was standing behind me. “Don’t go away,” I said and then made for the car. Estelle had already yanked the Ford into gear, and as soon as my ass dropped into the seat, she slipped her foot from brake to accelerator. The cruiser kicked gravel all the way out to the highway.

“What’s up?” I said as she got the car straightened out and howling on the pavement.

“Paul Garcia thinks he’s found the pickup truck.” Estelle Reyes-Guzman’s voice was charged with excitement. She was riding the cop’s high that comes when a burst of new information cracks a case wide open and makes the adrenaline flow. I stayed quiet, not wanting to distract her. I didn’t want the county car plunging into the canyon. Besides, I was feeling a little let down. Here I had spent an evening pumping gossip out of a priest, and a rookie deputy sheriff had gone and solved a murder case.

I didn’t need to see the speedometer to know that the county cruiser was rocketing up Isidro Creek canyon fast enough to turn us both into jelly if we ran off the pavement.

If we didn’t wipe out a tourist family just as they pulled out of a campground, it would be a deer standing stupidly in the middle of the road just after a corner, blinded by the lights and spellbound by the noise.

Estelle held the steering wheel tightly in one hand, and with the other she played the powerful spotlight along the sides of the highway far ahead of us. Her jaw was set in determination. I reached back and groped for the seat belt, then pulled it around my girth and snapped it tight.

We entered a long straight stretch and I asked, “How does Garcia know it’s the truck?”

“He spent the afternoon dogging after someone who might have seen something…anything. I guess he hit paydirt. Pat Waquie said he’d seen a blue over white Ford half-ton cruising around the village last night.”