Barbara Sissel - Safe Keeping

“Oh, Tucker.” Lissa rested her head against the seatback. She had no idea what else to say. They passed several miles in silence.

Tucker broke it. “Bad thing is they got my DNA, got my prints, the works.”

Lissa whipped around, finding his gaze, even in the dark. “You let them? Why? Why didn’t you tell them you wanted a lawyer? God, Tucker! Didn’t you learn anything last time?”

“It would have looked bad if I didn’t cooperate.”

Evan asked, “Are you saying you had sex with Jess—Chantelle, whatever her name is...was? They’ll get a match?”

“They could, I guess, but one of the cops who ID’d her body works security part-time at Mystique. He knows Jessica and I hung around a lot together. You know the guy, Liss. Sonny Cade? I think he was in your class at Hardys Walk High, wasn’t he?”

“I remember him, but he was a couple of years behind me. He was kind of a thug, always in trouble. He’s a policeman now?”

“Yep. He’s still a tough guy, but he’s sharp. Runs his own security firm on the side. He knows a lot about the shit that goes on at the club.”

Lissa and Evan exchanged a glance, and Lissa knew they were sharing the same sinking sensation of dread.

Tucker touched her shoulder and said he was sorry, and when she didn’t respond, he settled back, but she was aware of him, of his distress, all the same. She knew his remorse was as real and true as her frustration. But he never changed; he just kept on making the same mistakes, again and again.

“Come on, Liss, it’s going to be fine. Don’t worry.”

How? she wondered. But she didn’t ask. She doubted he had an answer, or if he did, it would be one he’d invented, to placate her.

“I wish you guys had been with us in Austin.” Tucker bent forward. “You would have loved it. That band I was telling you about? I knew the bass player. Me and the dude I was with—”

“What dude?” Lissa asked again.

“You don’t know him,” Tucker said. “The cool thing was we hooked up with these chicks, and we’re sitting there in the club—we got, like, this whole backstage vibe going on, because of me. Because I knew the drummer and the bass player. The chicks were into it. It was great.”

Lissa caught the flash of Tucker’s teeth in the road light and knew he was grinning.

“What can I say?” he asked, having fun with it. “The women love me.”

“Jesus, Tuck.” Evan shook his head.

“Sorry.”

For several moments there was only the sound of the tires, the hum of the truck’s engine. The cab was washed in a dirty swirl of road light.

Tucker bent forward, touching Lissa’s shoulder. “Look, all B.S. aside, I’m really sick about this. Underneath all that crazy shit, Chantelle was a nice girl. Not in the same class as Miranda, but she could have been if she hadn’t gotten messed up on coke and meth. I was trying to help her.”

“Oh, Tucker, when are you ever going to learn? Women like that don’t want to be helped.”

“Nobody deserves to die the way she did, Liss. To get killed and tossed into the woods like a sack of trash. I wish I’d been with her. I wish we hadn’t gotten so pissed off with each other.”

“What do you mean pissed off?” Evan asked.

“It was nothing, really. We had a—a discussion, you know?”

“A fight, you mean,” Lissa said.

“That’s why I left the party,” Tucker said. “I’m sorry as shit now.” His voice wobbled, and Lissa felt her own tears rise in her throat.

“Was Todd Hite there? Did he know Jessica?” Evan asked. “Could she have been involved with him the way Miranda was?”

Lissa turned to Evan. “Oh, my God,” she murmured. It had been a while since she’d thought of him. Todd Hite had been the other person of interest in Miranda’s murder case besides Tucker—someone else’s brother, son, uncle, source for heartbreak. Lissa had been convinced Todd was guilty. The whole family had thought so. Todd Hite was—or he had been—a stockbroker until a police undercover operation exposed him as the ringleader of a white-collar gang, composed mostly of his clients, who were involved in everything from money laundering and drugs to prostitution. Somehow, because Miranda attended several of the gang functions as an escort, Todd got the idea she was a police informant. He was overheard threatening her life. A month later she was dead.

“Why are you asking about him?” Tucker sounded wary.

Lissa knotted her hands.

“Because, he blamed Miranda when he got arrested, remember?” Evan said. “He accused her of ratting him out. He got fired because of her. He was pretty pissed off. Maybe it was the same with Jessica.”

“Hite’s full of shit.”

“You don’t think Miranda or Jessica were working with the cops?” asked Evan.

“Hell, no. Miranda would have told me,” Tucker said. “Look, there were a lot of people at the party in Galveston. A lot of guys. Hite could have been there, I guess, but I doubt it.” He sounded forlorn now. Pressing his palms together, he knifed his hands between his knees. “Goddamn it, I do not want to see Pop. Do you guys?”

“We could get something to eat,” Lissa said. She wasn’t hungry, but she didn’t want to face their folks, either.

“I could go for a burger.” Evan pulled into the parking lot of Ace’s Grill, a diner and pool hall near Lissa’s parents’ house, and while Evan and Tucker went inside to order their hamburgers and beers, Lissa called home. She was relieved it was her mom, not her dad, who answered, even though she had to reassure her mother a dozen times that Tucker was fine, everybody was fine.

“We’re just getting a hamburger, Mom,” Lissa said.

“I roasted two chickens,” Lissa’s mother said. “There’s plenty for everyone.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. We didn’t know. The guys are already inside ordering. Will it keep until tomorrow?”

Her mother said she imagined it would get eaten one way or another. She said, “You’re sure Tucker’s okay now, he’s in the clear?”

Lissa said she hoped so. She said they’d be there within the hour.

Tucker and Evan were already eating when she joined them. She unwrapped her burger.

“Your folks okay?” Evan asked.

“Mom made dinner for everyone,” Lissa said.

“Uh-oh. Should have known.” Tucker took a swallow of his beer. “Is she mad?”

“No. You’ll have it for lunch tomorrow.” Lissa set down her burger; she wiped her fingers on her napkin. “Listen, Tucker, about this morning, at the house, I didn’t mean anything.”

“I know. It’s all right,” he said, but he wouldn’t look at her.

“It isn’t that I don’t believe in you.”

Now he met her eyes. “I said I know.”

Lissa held his glance a moment, then picked up her burger again. “Where did you go, anyway, after you left? Where did the police find you?”

“Morgan’s apartment. I was taking her car back to her. They got me in the parking lot there.”

“Who’s Morgan?” Evan asked.

“There wasn’t any reason not to go with them,” Tucker said, as if he hadn’t heard Evan, or maybe, Lissa thought, Tucker was ignoring him. Maybe, for once, he was embarrassed to admit he’d been picked up by yet one more woman, a total stranger, and spent the night with her, in her bed.

“I don’t understand why you would talk to them, though, without a lawyer, Tuck.” Lissa rewrapped her burger. She couldn’t finish it, or her French fries, or her beer.

“You’re done?” Evan asked. “Was it bad?”

“No, it’s fine. My head hurts, is all.”

“It’s hurting all the time lately,” Tucker said.

“Too much of the time.” Evan wiped his mouth, wadded his paper napkin and tossed it into his empty burger basket. “Do I have to make an appointment with Dr. White, or will you?”