C. Box - Cold Wind

He wondered how they’d take the news. April had never been close to Missy, and Missy regarded her as an interloper. Slightly higher on the food chain than Joe himself, in fact. It was an alliance they shared.

Although Lucy had distanced herself from Missy in the past year, there was absolutely no doubt that Missy preferred her over all the girls. At one time, when Lucy was still vulnerable to her grandmother’s charms, Missy had gone through a period where she bought matching outfits for the two of them and took her favorite granddaughter for shopping and long lunches.

“Something terrible happened today,” Marybeth said to the girls on the couch.

“You took my phone,” April muttered.

Marybeth closed her eyes, fighting back anger. “Much worse than a phone,” she said. “Your Grandmother Missy was accused of murdering Earl. They found his body this morning. In fact, your dad found it.”

April’s mouth shot open involuntarily, then just as quickly she realized that she was baring her feelings and she shut it again. It was as if the Perpetual Mask of Petulance had slipped momentarily. Joe was relieved to see there was still a girl inside vulnerable to such news.

Lucy’s eyes were huge. She said, “I got some texts in school asking me about Grandma Missy, but I didn’t know what to answer.”

“I got no texts,” April hissed, “because you people stole my phone.”

“It’s all been a terrible misunderstanding,” Marybeth said, ignoring April.

“You mean Earl isn’t dead?” Lucy asked softly.

“No. he’s gone,” Marybeth said. Then she turned to him. “Joe?”

“He was murdered,” Joe said. “No doubt about it. Somebody killed him.”

“But it wasn’t Grandmother Missy?” Lucy asked, looking back and forth from Joe to Marybeth.

“Of course not,” Marybeth said. “But she’s been accused of it. We don’t have all the facts yet, but we think someone made it look like she had something to do with the crime. We don’t know who or why. Once everything’s investigated, she’ll be back home.”

“I can’t believe it,” Lucy said. “Did she stab him or poison him or what?”

“Neither,” Marybeth said heatedly.

Joe thought it interesting Lucy made the leap from Earl’s death to how Missy would have likely chosen to kill him.

“He was shot,” Joe said. “Then hung from a windmill.”

“Eeew,” April said, making a face.

“This is like a joke,” Lucy said. “What will people say about her? What will people think about us ?”

Exactly, Joe thought.

April snorted and sat back in the couch, her arms still folded across her like an iron breastplate. “Well,” she said, “I guess maybe I’m not the only one in this perfect little family who makes mistakes .”

Marybeth recoiled, tears suddenly in her eyes. Joe reached out and pulled Marybeth to him and said to April, “I know you’re mad, but that wasn’t necessary.”

“But it’s true,” April said, narrowing her eyes, looking mean. “Maybe it’s time you people learned how to handle the truth.”

“Actually,” Joe said, “I think we’re pretty good at it.”

April rolled her eyes, suddenly bored.

“Meeting’s over,” Joe said. His tone was hard. And effective, since he rarely used it.

April sprang up and marched to her bedroom, smirking and satisfied with herself, but a quick look back at him indicated she thought she might have gone too far.

Lucy got up and walked behind her, slowly, and before she entered her room she said, “If anyone cares, I got the part.”

Joe felt as if he’d been punched. They hadn’t even thought to ask her about it. Marybeth pulled away from him and said to Lucy’s back, “I’m sorry, honey. I’ve had so much on my mind. ”

They lay in bed awake, neither speaking. Joe ran through the events of the day in his head, trying to make sense of them. Trying to come up with alternative scenarios to the one most compelling and obvious. Trying to figure out why an innocent woman would be on the telephone to Marcus Hand within minutes of hearing about the death of her husband.

And wondering who had tipped off the sheriff.

Marybeth no doubt had the same thoughts. But there was more. At one point she sighed and said to Joe, “I hope this doesn’t tear our family apart.”

“Missy?” Joe asked.

“Her, too,” Marybeth answered. Then, after a few moments: “I miss Sheridan. It doesn’t feel right to go through this with her gone. I want all my girls around me when something like this happens.”

“She’s not that far,” Joe said.

“Yes, Joe. She is.”

The phone rang at two-thirty and Joe snatched it up. He was wide awake. Marybeth rolled to her side and arched her eyebrows in a “Who can that possibly be?” look.

“I can’t find the bourbon,” Marcus Hand boomed. “A bottle of twenty-year-old Blanton’s, to be precise. The best bourbon on the planet is what I’m talking about. I gifted one bottle to Earl and asked him to save the other for me when I visited again. I’ve turned this house upside down and I can’t find it. Where do you suppose he hid it?”

Joe said, “I don’t know. He’s dead.”

“I’ll find it before the night is over,” Hand said, as if he were talking to himself. Then: “The reason I called. I mean, the other reason. Tonight after consulting with my client, I met with the comely Miss Schalk to review the charges and get a lay of the land. Turns out the bulk of the case revolves around information passed to the sheriff from an informant intimately involved with the planning and execution of the crime.”

“I knew that,” Joe said, swinging his legs out from beneath the covers and sitting up. He could hear Hand rooting around in what sounded like pots and pans.

Hand said, “Apparently, he started talking to the sheriff a couple months ago, telling him this crime was going to happen. McLanahan is thickheaded, as we know, and sort of entertained the guy without ever believing him. Until this morning, when the guy called the sheriff at home and described the murder and the location of the body. And according to the fetching Miss Schalk, the informant is willing to testify against your mother-in-law.”

Hand spoke so loudly his voice carried throughout the bedroom from the phone.

Marybeth whispered, “What’s his name?”

“What’s his name?”

“Damn. I wrote it down.” More clanking and clanging. “Where did he hide my Blanton’s? Hiding a man’s bourbon. This alone would justify shooting him, if you ask me.”

“I didn’t ask,” Joe said, gripping the phone tight. “Can’t you remember his name?”

Hand sighed. “Bud something. Kind of a cowpoke name. Missy’s ex-husband.”

Marybeth heard and gasped.

“Bud Longbrake?” Joe said. “Bud is McLanahan’s informant?”

“Yeah, that’s the name.”

“I can’t believe it,” Joe said.

“Believe it. That’s the name. Of course, I know nothing of this man’s credibility. And the Longbrake name is well known here in Twelve Sleep County, so I should have recalled it right away.”

“Oh, my God,” Marybeth whispered.

“Missy divorced Bud and got his ranch in the settlement,” Joe said. “She’s had nothing to do with him for two years. She even got a restraining order on him so he wouldn’t try to contact her ever again. He’s spent the last two years inside a bottle.”

“Kind of where I’d like to be right now,” Hand said.

Joe said, “Bud has every reason in the world to frame her. She weaseled his third-generation ranch away from him by making him sign a pre-nup he never bothered to read because he was so madly in love. This might blow the case out of the water.”