I pulled away from the curb and pointed the car toward Amarillo.
“You’ll feel better if you talk about it, Sweet Pea.”
Maybe about some things. My ponytail had collapsed. I pushed back a strand of hair that was blowing around in my face. Words came out before I thought them. “Why’d you leave Mother? The real reason.”
He shifted in his seat, readjusted, looked at his hands. I took in the view. The panhandle countryside had sprung into spring. Most of the year the prairie was brown, but now it was alive with green grass, flowering cactus in yellow, fuchsia, and white, and tall stems of red yucca blossoms. Today they stood relatively straight in the absence of our usually ferocious wind.
When he spoke, he didn’t turn his head to look at me. “Some men gotta lose something to know its value. Your mother is—”
“Annoying?”
“No?”
“Irritating?”
“Not that.”
“Smothering?”
He chuckled. “Well, maybe a little of that. But you better watch what you say; you’re a lot like her.”
“I’m nothing like her! I’m like the reincarnation of you.” Except that I’d never killed anyone.
He smiled. “Anyway, I married young, even younger than she did—”
“What?”
He scowled. “You didn’t know your mother and I had each been married before?”
I exited Soncy and turned north onto Loop 335. “No. No one ever told me.”
“Well, I was. So was she.”
“Oh my dog.” After all the trouble she’d given me about divorcing Rich, she’d been married before. How I wished I’d known this six months earlier.
“He was an older fella. I guess you could say it was an arranged marriage. By her parents. They were a little—”
“Nuts?”
“Zealous.”
I sighed. “So how’d she get rid of him?”
“He died of a heart attack when she was eighteen.”
“Holy mackerel, I’m sorry. I was being catty. Go on.”
“I was divorced. My first wife left me when I wouldn’t stay home and work for her daddy. In Dalhart, where we grew up.”
“But you wanted to rodeo.”
“Yup. And I was good at it. Made the National Finals when I was twenty-three. That’s where I met your mother.”
“Where she was . . . ?” I said, hopefully.
“Pretty as a picture and sweet as sugar. We got married a week later.”
I couldn’t imagine my parents that young and impetuous, but I had to have gotten it from somewhere. “And then?”
“She traveled with me for a couple of years. Then we had you and set up base camp here.”
“So I ended the fun.”
“Oh no, Sweet Pea, you started it. I wanted to be here with you guys more than I wanted to be on the road. We made it work, for a long time. And then one day, I just couldn’t imagine why anyone that would want me that much was worth wanting.”
“Daddy!”
He shrugged. “Jilly—that was my first wife’s name—really messed with my head. I guess I loved her. And when she didn’t love me, it burrowed in deep. Like a bomb with a timer, just waitin’ to go off and blow my life to bits.”
“Wow. I don’t know what to say. I guess just I’m sorry. That sounds awful.”
“It was worse for your mother. She didn’t do anything wrong. Didn’t see it comin’.”
We passed the Wildcat Bluff Nature Center as we made the curve to the east.
I pictured my mother, back then. Red-rimmed, puffy eyes. Too bright smile. Chin high, shoulders back. “Yeah, it was hard on her.”
“After a while, I went to Dalhart. Looked up Jilly.”
I darted my eyes toward him. “You did?”
“Yup. I’m not gonna lie. She was beautiful. Divorced again. Making herself available.”
“Did you guys get back together?” It hurt me to even say it.
“Nah. That’s the moment I realized that while I’d loved Jilly, it was a long time ago. I loved your mother.”
“And then what happened?”
“Nothing. Too much time had passed, and I decided I needed to make some money so I could go back and buy your mother somethin’ nice, so she’d forgive me. I went to the next rodeo, then the next. Won big. Stashed my money in a safety-deposit box in Calgary.” He stopped. “This next part I ain’t proud of.”
“It’s okay, Dad, go on.”
“Some men offered to pay me big to lose. So I did.”
We crossed Amarillo Creek and I sucked in a deep breath. My eyes cut to him. “Oh man, that must have been hard.”
“It was, the first time. I decided to go do just one more before I went home. I lost, all right, but I got hurt, hurt bad, and I couldn’t rodeo. Those same guys paid me to do some little jobs. My money was still in Calgary, but I was following the circuit and before you know it we were down in New Mexico. They told me I needed to lame a horse to make sure an event came out like they needed it to. I said no.”
“I’m so glad.”
“One of ’em threatened you and your mother, made it clear they knew how to find you.”
I turned north on 287, sneaking glances at Dad as I watched the traffic. “Oh no!”
“That’s the one I got with the beer bottle.”
“Wait, I thought, but Jack said, um—”
“That it was self-defense?”
“Yes.”
“Well, now you know the truth.” My head felt funny, light and dizzy. Dad hadn’t killed in self-defense? He’d murdered a man outright? His voice sounded a million miles away. “Then I found myself in a six-by-six cell in New Mexico with a lot of time on my hands to think.” He snorted. “I’ve never been much of a thinker, Sweet Pea. Even then, it didn’t come to me fast or easy.”
We drove in silence. My brain struggled to wrap itself around what my father had just told me. He’d admitted to cold-blooded murder. I couldn’t swallow, I could hardly breathe. This made things so, so much worse, and I didn’t even want to look at him or be in the car with him. Searching for a place to stop so I could get out and try to get myself together, I took an exit off 287. At the bottom of the exit ramp, we splashed through a lake-sized puddle, and when I glanced right, I saw water pouring out of an overflow pipe leading to God knew where. The route I’d escaped on was a familiar route. It led to the Mighty is His Word church and pretty much nothing else. Rather than make a U-turn, I wheeled the Mustang onto the long dirt road leading up to the church and lurched into a parking space adjacent to the sanctuary.
The church itself was a cavernous metal building. From the outside, it was just a giant red square with a silver roof. You expected to see cows spilling out the side doors and roosters in the yard. But instead there was a big white cross over the entrance and the MIGHTY IS HIS WORD logo on the side, ten feet across and nearly as high. And today, a giant banner strung from one end of the building to the other that read Are you prepared to die for God like Jesus did?
“You taking me to church?” Dad asked. “Seems like I just confessed all my sins.”
“Did you ever.”
He frowned at my tone of voice. “What?”
“I believed the self-defense thing. This is a lot to take in.”
His mouth dropped. “But Sweet Pea, I’d do anything to protect you and your mother. Anything.”
“You could have called the police.”
“Well, in hindsight, that might have been an option. But in a dark parking lot when someone’s threatening you and the ones you love, well, I did what I had to do.”
I closed my eyes. The picture of slashing glass still loomed, much more violent and personal than, say, killing someone from a distance with a gun or poison. But I guessed I could understand him, sort of. And in a weird way I was less unhappy about him killing someone out of love for us than in a bar fight. If someone threatened Jack and Betsy, would I kill them? It depended on the circumstances,
but if I was honest with myself, I might. Even now, when Jack wasn’t making it easy to love him, with his lies and deceit.
I nodded, biting the inside of my lower lip. “Can I ask you a few more questions, Pops?”
“Fire away.”
“Did you ever lie to Mother, hide things from her?” I knew the answer. I just wanted to get him to talk about the reason.
“Oh, gosh yes, many times over.”
“Why?”
“I told myself I was protecting her, although now that I have time to reflect, I know I was mostly protecting myself. She didn’t need that money in Calgary.”
I nodded slowly. “She just needed you to come home.”
He wiped a tear. “Yeah. But one of these days you or Jack or your Mother’s going to have to make a run to Calgary for me, since I’m on parole and can’t do it myself.”
“Your money’s still there?”
“Sure is. Enough to make fetching it worthwhile.”
I grinned. “I just might could do that for you, Dad.”
“Good.” He smacked me on the leg. “Now, mind me asking why we’re at a church?”
I turned to him, both hands up by my shoulders, and said, “Yo no se,” like I did incessantly when I first learned Spanish as a freshman in high school, not long before he left. Which was true, and not true. I wanted my daddy to help me figure out how not to lose Betsy, even if I wasn’t yet entirely comfortable with his choices, and somehow that had brought us here.
“Well, when you do figure it out, let me know.”
I grabbed my purse from the backseat and fished out my cell phone. I woke it up and opened the pictures app. The picture I’d taken in Sanford the day before came up first. I pointed it at my dad. “I think that’s a match. What say you?”
He took the phone from me and held it up at arm’s length, squinting, so that the logo on the side of the church and the phone screen were both in his field of vision. “Yup.”
I bit my lip, pondering things before I spoke. “Jack and I had a visit scheduled with Betsy today. She was a no-show, thanks to her foster parents. This is their church.” There were a handful of vehicles in the parking lot. I caught sight of their white passenger van.
“Are they here?”
“Yes.” I pointed at it. I took my phone back and clicked the screen dark. As I did, motion at the entrance to the church caught my eye. “There they are.” A teenage boy held the door open as Mary Alice, Trevon, and a succession of young people exited the building. I was glad I was in a rental car, because they wouldn’t notice me craning and staring, which I was. The last child in line brought a quick sting to my eyes. Betsy. She was in a pink dress with white polka dots and had pink bows at the ends of her pigtails. I wanted to call out to her, but I knew better.
“Big family. Cute girl.”
I wiped my eyes. “Yeah, the Hodges have eleven foster kids, plus one birth child. All of them are classified as special needs, including Betsy.” I kept my eyes on Betsy, drinking her in. “Wallace told me that the Mighty is His Word families account for half the foster placements in Amarillo, and almost ninety percent of the special needs placements. Either they’re do-gooders on a mission, or something else, and the cynical side of me thinks they’re milking the state.” I gave my head a rapid tiny shake and sighed fast and hard. Betsy was climbing into the side of the van. She hadn’t smiled the whole time I watched her, or talked with her siblings, or laughed. I wanted to run to her and swing her around in a circle by her arms and hear her infectious giggle. But I couldn’t. She disappeared from my view, but I kept watching.
Dad turned his head to the side, squinting at the monstrous building in front of us. “It’s like a state-sponsored church. And the state ain’t s’posed to be in the religion business.”
The van door slammed, and the engine to the van started. “Don’t ever say you’re no good at thinking.” I watched the van as it backed out of its parking space, Trevon at the wheel. My eyes followed it as it left the parking lot and drove away with a piece of my heart. I wiped my eyes again.
“Nah, I just had a lot of time to practice.”
Since we were there, I had an urge to go in, an itch begging for a scratch. And who better to have with me if something went wrong than the man who had proven he’d do whatever it took to keep me safe? “Want me to show you the inside?”
“Why not?”
We got out and walked briskly toward the church. I left my purse in the car, so I shoved my keys and both my hands into my pockets, kicking a dirt clump as I did. Then a rock. Then a bigger rock. It zinged off my foot and onto the metal shell of the church. Clang! We turned up the sidewalk toward the entrance. It was nondescript, except for the prominent No Trespassing sign. Otherwise, just two glass front doors opening café style. I grabbed the one on the right and held it for Dad.
He tipped an imaginary hat at me, and I followed him through. We were in a fairly large vestibule. On the far end were the doors to the sanctuary. On a side was a hallway. On another side were bulletin boards. I sauntered to that one, wanting to hum the theme to Mission: Impossible as I did.
“Welcome to Mighty is His Word,” a rich baritone voice said.
Beside me, Dad answered. “Why, thank you very much, sir.”
I pretended to be reading, but I couldn’t, because I knew this voice. It belonged to Pastor Will, the star witness for the prosecution against Phil in his recent burglary trial.
“We’re a closed campus to visitors when services aren’t in session, but I’d be happy to speak with you in my office if you would like.”
“Um . . .” Dad said.
I felt bad for him. He had no way of knowing the history. “No, we’ll be on our way. Sorry.”
Pastor Will turned his attention to me, still pleasant until he saw my face. First he looked confounded, then angry. “You should know this is private property better than most people, and you’re trespassing. I don’t think the same excuse will work for you as worked for your client.”
Clearly I’d worn out my welcome here. But no one knew me in Sanford, at the other location. I could continue looking into things there, maybe find something that would show why the Hodges shouldn’t get Betsy. I tugged on my father’s elbow. “Come on, Dad.”
We walked out, and I could feel the sizzle of Pastor Will’s laser-beam eyes searing my back.
“Gotta be a story there,” Dad said.
“Oh, there is.” We hightailed it out. I gave Dad the scoop, but in the background, my mind was putting together a plan to visit Mighty is His Word in Sanford, Texas.
Chapter Sixteen
From my seat in the back pew of the packed sanctuary, the female preacher looked about ten feet tall, with a thick gray braid down to her waist. The man standing behind her and to the right was about her age and even taller. They were alone on the dais, and she spoke into a wireless microphone rather than from a pulpit, pacing like a caged tiger.
“Brother Furman and I know,” she said, raising both her arms in the air, then letting them fall. “We see it firsthand every day. We know the evil in our communities, the way that Satan is building his army against us. Jesus knew. He gave his life to fight against it. And on the third day he rose from the dead and ascended to the right hand of God the Father, Almighty.”
The congregation unexpectedly shouted, “Amen!” as one. I jumped.
“God rewarded his sacrifice with everlasting life, like he promises us.” She pointed behind her to a giant Jesus, his limp body hanging from nails on a cross.
It looked entirely too realistic to me, although I doubted that the real Jesus had limp, flabby pecs like this one, not at his age, and not with the life he led. Poor Jesus, to be memorialized as a wimp.
“You preach it, Sister Furman,” someone shouted in front of me, man or woman, I couldn’t tell.
The crowd started to stir in their seats, and the energy level rose.
“Brother Furman and I know something else, too, though. We know that wit
h God with us, there’s no army that can defeat us.”
Now ten or more “Amens” rang out, along with some whoops.
“Look around you, brothers and sisters, look around you. These are your comrades in arms. These are the soldiers that will be fighting by your side when the Wrath of God is unleashed.”
The congregation went nuts and their shouts rattled the metal roof. People leapt to their feet. “Hallelujah.” “Amen.” “Thank you, Jesus.” “The Wrath of God.” Two men beside me hugged, and a woman with long black hair lifted her face to the ceiling and cried.
It was the weirdest Easter celebration I hoped to ever see in my whole life. I noticed I was the only one still seated, so I jumped to my feet, clasping my hands in front of me. I could feel the soft, indented skin on my ring finger from my engagement ring. The one I’d left in the console of the Mustang on a whim before coming inside the church. On my right a heavy man raised both his hands to heaven and closed his eyes. He chanted, “My life for yours, God. My life for yours.”
On my left a smaller man with thick facial hair threw his arms around me and lifted me in the air. “I’ve got your back, Sister.”
He released me and I squeaked out an “Amen” in a cracking voice. I decided the lifted hands/chanting pose was safer and copied the guy on my right.
Just when I thought it would never end, Sister Furman’s voice rang out over the mic.
“Our own son, Brother Richie, gave his very life to fight evil. No greater calling.”
“No greater calling,” the crowd echoed back.
“He died, but how many unborn children lived because he had the courage to bring the Wrath of God down upon the abortionists?”
Holy mackerel. What in the heck was she talking about? Sister Furman was scaring the bejeebers out of me. I stole a furtive glance toward the exit.
“Wrath of God,” the crowd fired back at her.
“And he has been rewarded with life everlasting, I can assure you of that. I send you back out into the world, brothers and sisters, until we meet again, knowing that you will be strong in the face of evil, ready to bring the Wrath of God, for Mighty is His Word.”
Hell to Pay (What Doesn’t Kill You, #7): An Emily Romantic Mystery Page 16
