Chris Whitaker - We Begin at the End

“You could have still—”

She cut him off with eyes full of tears. “I didn’t want to live a lie.”

“Milton is dead. The butcher. I think Darke killed him. I think Darke killed Hal to get to the children.”

“He’s worried the boy will remember.”

Walk nodded. “Darke can’t come back here now. He owes money to people, bad people.” He’d run the plates, this time got a hit. The sedan was registered to a construction company in Riverside, one of the directors was linked to a known crime family. Darke’s problems would not go away.

She looked at him then. “Take it to Boyd. They need protecting.”

“I have. He still doesn’t buy it.”

“Because Vincent King is in the way.”

“But if he were innocent. If we can get him off …”

“Shit, Walk. The best trial lawyer in the country couldn’t get him off.”

“If Vincent is innocent then Darke is coming for Robin Radley, not Duchess.” Walk closed his eyes to the tremors, rubbed his neck, the muscles so stiff it hurt to turn his head.

“You want to tell me what’s wrong now, Walk? You think I haven’t noticed all this time. You look tired. You’ve lost a lot of weight.”

“It’s just the stress.”

“Say that enough and you’ll start to believe it.”

“I won’t.”

He watched an old lady pass the door, a kneel and cross before she went on. Maybe she slept better after.

“You’re all purpose, Walk. I used to look at you and see everything inside.”

“I want to be that man again. I just … it’s all changing. I’m losing myself. I feel it, every day. I used to think everything was changing around me. I drove past Toller land. Hard to imagine, all those homes.”

“People need to live somewhere, Walk.”

“Second homes. They’ll push the town further away.”

“You like things how they are. I’ve seen your house. Your office. You cling hard enough to the past.”

“There was a time when things were better. When we were kids, don’t you remember that? I saw my life fixed, cop in the town I grew up in, wife and kids, Little League, camping out.”

“And Vincent across the street, maybe your wives are friends. You vacation together. You barbeque, watch your kids in the surf.”

“I still see that moment, thirty years and it’s clear. It’s so … I can touch it. But I can’t change it.”

“Tell me about the Vincent you remember.”

“There’s nothing he wouldn’t do for me. That kind of blind loyalty. He had girls, but Star was the one for him. He was quick with his fists, but never started the fight. He could go quiet, sometimes for days, and I knew his father was on him. And he was funny. He was everything to me. He was my brother. He is my brother.”

He could not read her eyes then. Outside the sun shone, the birds sang. “I thought I’d marry you, Martha. You know that?”

“I know that.”

“You’re on my mind. First thing in the morning. And when I lie in bed at night.”

“Masturbation is a sin.”

“Don’t say masturbation in church.”

“You like me because I’m safe, Walk. I’m the mirror of you. I don’t change, no surprises. Simple and dependable, till our idyllic childhood was shattered.”

“That’s not true.”

“It is. But there’s nothing wrong with that. We help people, Walk. I can think of no better way to live a life.”

“So you’ll do it.”

She did not answer.

“You think we’d have been together in another life?”

“This one ain’t over yet, Chief.” She reached across and calmed the shake of his hand with the warmth of hers.

* * *

Peter and Lucy picked them up from the Price house.

Shelly sat with them in the SUV, on the rear bench busying herself with paperwork as they drove.

Peter and Robin talked endlessly during the ride, about Jet and how he was afraid of birds, about a patient Peter saw who had hiccups a full year.

“Did you try scaring him?” Robin said.

“Pete’s face is enough to scare anyone.” Lucy winked at Duchess in the mirror. For her part Duchess smiled back, though she could not manage a laugh. That morning Mary Lou told her there wasn’t a chance some nice doctor and his wife would want a troubled girl in their house, not a girl that makes shitty grades and likes playing with guns. Duchess had taken it, eaten her cornflakes in silence while Mary Lou walked over and yanked the power cable from the back of the television they were watching.

They pulled over short of anywhere, idling at the side of the road while Peter and Lucy turned in their seats. Peter read from a guidebook.

“Going to the Sun Road. You ready?”

“Ready,” Robin said.

Peter looked at Duchess and smiled.

Beside her Robin squeezed her hand tight. “Ready.”

Going to the Sun Road spanned fifty miles of towering rock. Light met them at the east tunnel, two mountains parting like the opening of a show.

They crawled along sheer drops, the road twisting to nothing ahead, a rollercoaster ride so beautiful Duchess closed her eyes.

They traversed valleys, waterfalls loud beside, wildflower so many colors. Cliffside trails fell to limpid lakes, tall pines leaned with the hill, like they were trying not to fall.

Lucy pulled out a Nikon and snapped off shot after shot. Behind, Shelly leaned forward and placed a hand on Duchess’s shoulder, gave it a squeeze like she knew the girl needed it.

They pulled off at Jackson Glacier. Lucy took a hamper from the trunk and laid a blanket on the grass. Robin sat with Peter and they ate sandwiches and potato chips, drank juice boxes and watched waving shadows over the lagoon.

“Grandpa would like it here,” Robin said.

Duchess ate her sandwich, thanked Lucy and tried to smile. At times she felt so far from a place she had never been, like home was somewhere out there and calling, she just did not know how to find it. She wiped her eyes on her sleeve, felt Lucy watching her and maybe wondering, how fucked up is this kid? Do I really want her in my life for now and always?

“Are you okay, Duchess?” Lucy said.

“Yes. Thank you.” She wanted it to sound sincere but didn’t know how. She wanted to convey it, that she could live quietly in their life, not disrupt, not impact at all so long as they loved her brother and cared for him.

She stood and walked to the fencing, leaned over and watched shallow water and blue stone beneath, purple flowers that bled with bright, a sweep of lodgepole serried.

Lucy joined her, said nothing and Duchess was grateful.

On the ride back they slowed for mountain goat and bighorn sheep.

“What if they fall?” Robin said.

“Don’t worry,” Peter said. “I’m a doctor.”

Lucy rolled her eyes.

Duchess studied Peter, the way he drove so cautiously, how natural his smile was. She imagined a life ordered, where everything fit just right. There was a calm to him, unhurried, people would pass him by and he didn’t notice or care. She thought he’d make a decent father for Robin.

When they got back she watched Robin hug Peter, arms locked tight around his waist. And she saw the look that passed between them, Peter and Lucy.

Duchess knew it with some certainty.

They had found their new home.

35

THEY WORKED LONG INTO THE night, Martha making coffee at midnight then again at two.

They’d spent the afternoon in Fairmount County, with Vincent. Martha had recorded, tried to coach and prompt but there was no way Vincent would take to the stand so he’d said nothing. It was an exercise in futility, but Walk had hoped maybe seeing that Martha believed in him would give Vincent the excuse he needed to finally unload everything that had happened that night.