Jeff Abbott - A Kiss Gone Bad

‘So what was Corey’s beef with Delford?’

‘I think,’ she said slowly, ‘Corey took off because Delford caught wind of what he was planning.’

‘Which was?’

‘Well, Corey was probably kidding – you know loud-mouthed kids, but he told me he was gonna kill Delford Spires.’ She held her wineglass very still, in both hands.

Whit kept equally still. ‘How did he plan on doing this?’

She shrugged. ‘He had his daddy’s shotgun.’

Whit watched her; she stared at the hem of her cutoffs. ‘Why do you think he told you this, Marian?’

‘Just to impress me. He was ten pounds of shit in a Dixie cup.’

‘Why did he want to shoot Delford?’

‘I don’t know. He never told me why… so I never took him seriously. I mean, look, he couldn’t have been serious. Delford Spires is still alive.’

‘But Corey probably isn’t,’ he said, and she burst into tears.

‘You think Delford killed Corey?’

She cried, she shrugged. ‘Shit. I shouldn’t have said anything. Shit.’

Delford might be many things – political, pushy, too good-old-boy for a changing world, but Whit didn’t believe Delford was a cold-blooded killer. Especially a killer of children.

‘Why didn’t you tell anyone this?’

‘I did. Corey’s mama. I was afraid to talk to the police – afraid of Delford, I mean. I didn’t know what to think. So I told the senator, I phoned her, and she thanked me and nothing ever came of it. You know, I figured Corey would come home and she didn’t want him into trouble with Delford.’

Marian Duchamp got up with overdone precision, stumbled to the kitchen, and freshened her glass.

We build these little worlds for ourselves, Whit thought, remembering what Velvet had said, and then we never get to move out.

‘Do you remember two friends of Corey’s? From Houston. A boy named Eddie Gardner, another boy named Junior Deloache.’

‘Think so. They summered down here sometimes and fished in the fall on weekends. Junior always had lots of cash and dope to share.’ She remembered too late Whit was a judge and murmured, ‘Well, I don’t do anything illegal anymore, okay?’

‘What about Eddie?’

‘Just some lame-ass friend of Junior’s.’

And now he was a detective on the Port Leo police force. A very recent hire.

‘You seen either of them around lately?’

She shook her head. ‘Not in years, not since Corey took off.’

The door to the trailer opened, and a tall, fiftyish woman peeked her head inside. Her hair was pulled tight into a proper gray bun, and she wore a cleaning smock, festooned with a brightly colored, grinning cartoon chicken waving a spatula. She carried a grocery sack.

‘Oh, excuse me, hon. I didn’t know you were entertaining.’ The lady smiled with maternal grace at Whit, as though about to pat Whit’s head and offer him a sugar cookie.

‘Oh, come on in. Mama,’ Marian said. ‘This is Whit Mosley – he’s a judge.’

Whit helped Mama Duchamp tote grocery sacks. One bag clinked, full of bottles of wine: merlot, chardonnay, pinot noir, all of it the better stuff. He put the bags on the kitchen counter without comment, and Mama Duchamp murmured that she’d just brought some refreshments for her sweet baby girl and oh, she’d tend to getting those bottles put up.

‘Have some red. Mama,’ Marian called.

‘Perhaps later,’ Mama Duchamp said.

‘I was just going,’ Whit said. He thanked Marian for her time. She blinked, as if confused as to why she’d been crying, why he was here. With her mother in the room Marian seemed sunnier, as though reassured, like a puppy, that the milk dish brimmed full.

Mama Duchamp stepped outside with him, shutting the door on Marian’s hollered, slurred good-byes.

‘I know you’re a busy man, with a lot of doors to knock on,’ Mama Duchamp said. ‘Good luck in the election. I hope you win. I don’t trust people named Buddy. It’s like they want to be your friend before you even know them.’

‘Thanks. But I actually wasn’t here campaigning. I was asking Marian about Corey Hubble.’

He could smell the wry odor of throat lozenges on her breath. ‘Why?’

‘She says Corey was planning to commit a murder before he vanished.’

‘Oh, my lands. Marian doesn’t know what she says. She doesn’t think.’

‘It’s hard to think when you’re drinking all day.’

Mama Duchamp’s smile twitched. ‘She’s nervous. It soothes her.’

‘Do you do this all the time? Bring her what she needs to live?’

Her long, narrow hands smoothed the chicken apron. ‘Marian doesn’t fend well for herself. She messes up. It’s just easier if I… arrange things for her.’

‘My brothers and I used to do that for my father. He was a drunk.’

‘Don’t you presume to stand here and lecture me.’

‘For God’s sakes. Aren’t you tired of helping her along?’ Whit asked.

She brought a hand to her lipsticked mouth. ‘Tired of it? My God, Marian could be lying out in an alley, scrounging on a beach, selling herself for loose change. This way… I can keep an eye on her.’

In a cage nicely gilded by the glint from wine bottles. ‘I suppose it’s one way to be sure the kids stay in touch.’ He felt a sudden fury with this woman, letting her daughter drown by inches in scrubbed comfort, ‘I’ll bet her liver’s like wet tissue paper. Do you see the yellow tint in her eyes? That’s death creeping in. Jesus, Marian’s about my age. She won’t have long. Get her some help.’

‘Get off our property. I’m certainly not going to vote for you now, and I doubt that any member of the Garden Club will either once I make a few phone calls.’

‘I don’t want your vote, Mrs Duchamp,’ Whit said. Her face crimsoned, and she fled to the trailer. She shut the door quietly.

Whit roared out of the trailer park. His hands shook.

Get up, I’il bit, make me some bourb’coffee. Now. Move your ass. Babe’s voice, slurring from the past. And Whit crawled from bed, being extra quiet, and made the coffee, poured in the extra big dollop of whiskey to ease Daddy’s morning nerves. He was eight.

Whit pulled in at the next gas station and filled his tank.

Delford. Corey. What else to that story was there? Say Corey did come after Delford with a shotgun. If Delford killed Corey in self-defense, there was no reason to keep it secret. Marian’s testimony about Corey’s plans would have made a self-defense plea simple. If Delford or any of the authorities had heard of Corey’s threats, Corey would have promptly been arrested, charged, and dealt with in the judicial system. That was Delford’s way. He would never play judge and executioner. He had too much at stake to risk it over a punk kid like Corey Hubble.

But if Delford had killed Corey, then Delford could eliminate every iota of bothersome evidence. This theoretical killing might be impossible to prove.

He tried to imagine Corey stalking Delford, a grungy doper rich kid following around a respected officer. Corey would follow Delford, learn his routine, attempt to strike when Delford was most vulnerable – so when was that? What had the boy seen? What had he known? Why was he headed north?

He wondered where Delford was that fateful weekend.

Whit got out of his car, filled his tank, bought a fried apple pie and Dr Pepper at the convenience store, and ate a second lunch, all the while considering what would light the fuse of a pissy, self-centered fifteen-year-old.

He didn’t think of it until he thought about his own childhood, his own missing parent and what actions lit his own slow rage.

Jealousy. Resentment. The hungry need for a parent, even one who shows no interest.

Whit got on his cell phone and called Georgie.