Linwood Barclay: Parting Shot

“There’s something else,” she said.

Brian waited. Jessica took a few steps closer, and when she was six feet away from him he could see that she had been crying. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s about Ron,” she said.

“What about him?”

“He’s missing.”

Brian took several seconds before saying, “Oh.”

“He was doing this job? This house outside of town. His truck’s there but he’s not around. He’s been gone over twenty-four hours.”

“Jesus,” Brian said.

“At first I thought, maybe he left me. Which, you know, might not be such a bad thing. But if he left me, he sure as hell would have taken his truck. He loves that truck more than he loves me. He’s not answering his cell phone or anything.”

“I don’t know what to say. Have you called the police?”

Jessica Frommer nodded. “Yeah. They’re looking into it.”

“What do they think happened?”

Jessica shook her head. “They don’t know. They said they found blood.”

“Blood?”

“Like, on the ground.”

“That,” Brian said slowly, “sounds bad.”

“That’d mean maybe someone hurt him,” she said. “At first I thought, and don’t be mad when I say this, but at first I wondered, maybe you had something to do with it.”

“Me?”

“Because of Ron beating you up and all. You’d have plenty of reason to want to get back at him.”

“Jess, I’ve been in the hospital.”

She nodded. “Yeah, I know. That’s what I wanted to check first, before I told the police anything about you.”

“What?”

“The police asked if there might be anyone who’s got it in for Ron. And I thought of you, but I didn’t give them your name because I didn’t want to get you in trouble. I wanted to find out if you were in the hospital, and you were, so now I’m not going to give them your name.”

“Jeez, Jess, thanks for that.”

“But then I thought, did you tell anyone?”

Brian wondered if it was getting hotter out. He could feel beads of sweat forming on his forehead.

“Did I what?” he asked.

“Did you tell anyone about Ron beating you up?”

Brian thought about what his father had said to him. “ You never, ever told me his name. You never, ever told me where he lived. And no matter how many times someone might ask you the question, it’s always no. You never told me. ”

Brian said, “I never told anyone his name. I never told anyone where you live. Not ever.”

Jessica sniffed.

“Mommy!” the little girl in the car cried out.

“Just a second, sweetheart!” Jessica shouted over her shoulder.

“Never,” Brian added.

Jessica nodded. “Okay. The thing is, Ron wasn’t all that nice a guy. He probably pissed off a lot of other people. Could be anybody, when you think about it.” Another sniff. Brian dug into his pocket, pulled out a shredded tissue and offered it to her.

“That’s okay,” she said, wiping her cheeks on her sleeve. “Anyway, I should go.”

“Okay.”

She gave him an awkward half-second hug, then got back into her car. Brian stood there and watched as she put on her seat belt. The little girl in the backseat looked at him and pointed. “You’re the man my daddy beat up!” she said.

As the car drove off, Brian wondered if there was any chance the police would be questioning her .

Once Galen Broadhurst had been put into the back of a Promise Falls cruiser, Duckworth came over to me and said, “Well done. Now we just have to pick up Bob Butler.”

“Broadhurst and Butler sacrificed that poor kid to save their own asses and line their pockets.” I shook my head. “The bastards.”

Duckworth gave me a look that said he’d seen enough things in life not to be surprised any more.

“I’m going to pick up Jeremy,” I said, “then head out to Madeline Plimpton’s house. He wants to talk to his mother, let her know he’s okay.”

“We should go together.”

I looked at my watch. “Thirty minutes?”

He nodded. As he turned to leave, I said, “What was it you wanted to ask me? On the phone last night.”

Barry poked his tongue around the inside of his cheek. “You know what? Don’t worry about it. Whatever I was going to ask, I think I’ve changed my mind.”

I pointed my Honda back in the direction of my sister and brother-in-law’s house. I found Jeremy sitting on the front step talking to Celeste. He was on his feet when he saw my car, and ran to the street to meet me.

“What’s going on?” he asked as I powered down the window.

I gave Celeste a wave. “Thanks!”

“Nice kid!” she shouted, getting up and going back into the house.

Jeremy craned his neck around to respond, a slightly stunned look on his face. “Thank you,” he said.

I was willing to bet it was the nicest thing anyone had said to him in months.

He got in the car next to me. “Well?”

“Taking you home,” I said.

“What happened?”

I was going to tell him on the way, but thought better of it. This was something I had to tell him eye to eye. I shifted in my seat to look at him.

“You didn’t do it. You didn’t drive the car. You didn’t run down Sian.”

His chin began to tremble. “What...”

“Galen Broadhurst was driving the car.”

“How do you know?”

“He told me.”

Now his hands were shaking. “Oh my God. Oh my God.”

“There’s more,” I said gently. “Bob Butler helped him.”

I gave him the details, briefly and slowly, including the news that it had been Bob’s idea to have us killed. I couldn’t imagine how much it was to take in. Elation matched by betrayal.

He burst into tears. He started sobbing. I reached out with both arms and pulled him close to me, patted his back.

“The nightmare’s over,” I said, although I knew it was going to take a while for all of this to sink in. And there was going to be fallout. A lot of it.

The boy could not stop shaking. “Bob — he paid my legal bills.”

“Yeah, well, I guess he was feeling pretty guilty. It was the least he could do. Getting you off, so long as the blame didn’t shift elsewhere, was a pretty safe game for him to play.”

“My mom,” he said. “I have to tell my mom. I have to tell her what a bastard he is.”

“We’re gonna do that,” I assured him. “We’re gonna go over there now.”

Jeremy struggled to pull himself together. I found tissues in the glove box and dug out a handful for him.

“Thank you so much,” he said.

“They’re just tissues.”

“I mean, for everything. For figuring out that this whole thing was fucked up. For giving me my life back.”

I gave him a moment to get settled back into his seat, facing forward, before I keyed the ignition. “Let’s go,” I said.

I’d told Duckworth thirty minutes, but only twenty-five had passed when we pulled into the driveway of Madeline Plimpton’s house. Tires crunching on gravel was not enough to bring anyone running outside to greet us, but I could hear movement in the house when I rang the bell.

“Can’t we just walk in?” Jeremy asked.

“Not our house,” I said. “Manners.”

The door opened. Ms. Plimpton’s dour expression turned into one of joy when she saw us there.

“I tried all night to reach you!” she said, throwing her arms around the boy. “You had us worried sick.”

A second later, Gloria emerged from the kitchen area and shrieked. She had to pry Ms. Plimpton off Jeremy so she could hug him herself.

“I’m so glad you’re home!” she said. “It was a huge mistake, sending you away!” He tried to move her away as she planted kisses on his cheeks, then gave up and let her continue.