Maybe that was the whole “hammered shit” thing.
Eddy was coming down from a three-day high (okay, maybe four), and every bit of his body felt it. His eyeballs were two fucking massive marbles in his head, so glassy he could throw sand off of them; his skin itched as if it had been pulled off by hand, turned inside out, and stapled back on that way. His teeth went up and down, up and down, like tiny knife points, so he kept his mouth open, drooling, trying not to cut himself. His hands were jitterbugging, but at least they’d taken off the handcuffs, which had been hot to the touch on his turned-all-the-way-around, fucked-up skin. And he was goddamn thirsty, like trapped-in-the-desert-for-four-days (okay, maybe five) thirsty, but was afraid the water would taste like his own blood, so instead he just sat there: mouth open, bug-eyed, tongue hanging out.
He looked like a panting dog.
On the table in front of him sat a small handheld radio wrapped in plastic. No one was saying anything about it, but it kinda looked familiar, although he wasn’t sure.
The female deputy, the pretty Mexican girl, wasn’t doing much talking about that radio or anything else. She stared past him, like she was a hundred miles away somewhere else.
That stare could set ants on fire, though. Like playing with a magnifying glass in the Texas heat, something Eddy had done as a kid.
He’d set a whole bunch of little grass fires that way.
The other deputy, the fucker who’d coldcocked him down in the cane, was pointing a finger at him and going on and on about how Eddy had nearly killed him with a skillet. Now, there was a real possibility that something like that had, in fact, happened, although Eddy couldn’t remember it exactly. It might come to him later, though, unsummoned, while he was falling asleep or taking a piss, and then he’d be right back in that moment, reliving every second of it in too-bright colors. But Deputy What’s-his-name was righteously angry right now, although Eddy got the sense that only part of what he was pissed about involved Eddy at all.
For all Eddy’s faults, and they were legion, he’d had at one time a pretty good ability to read people, kinda a sixth sense. A Spidey sense (Eddy’s favorite superhero, although that Bat-dude was kinda badass, too). It had served him well and had kept him (mostly) out of serious trouble. But after too many years on too many drugs, it now came and went like a shaky radio signal out on the edge of the desert. When it worked, it worked just fine. But when it didn’t, Eddy was lost in the static, trapped between the AM stations his daddy had listened to while driving his truck. Then, it was like Eddy couldn’t even read, much less recognize, his own damn handwriting.
Right now, Eddy was having one of those moments of clarity. There was something going on between those two deputies, some electric current running between them that had nothing to do with Eddy Lee Rabbit. They were both going through the motions, but they weren’t happy about it, and they weren’t focused on the situation at hand.
They weren’t focused on him.
Maybe they were fuck buddies and had had a big fight, like he and Charity did all the time. Something like that.
Whatever it was, they had things on their mind that didn’t involve totally hammering the shit out of Eddy, and that was totally fine with him.
* * *
—
“YOU TRIED TO OPEN my skull with a goddamn skillet, Eddy,” the one deputy said. Donnie? Danny? Eddy wasn’t sure. “You’re dealing with assault on a law enforcement officer, no matter what else. You got that? With your record, you’re fucked.”
Eddy’s attorney, Paez, waved that off with the pen he’d been doodling with. “Eddy, despite Deputy Ford’s assertion, that’s not actually a legal opinion.” He pointed his pen at the angry deputy. “And besides, my client hasn’t admitted to this alleged assault. Right now, it’s your word against Mr. Rabbit’s . . .”
“Santino . . . please, please, don’t pull that shit with me . . .”
Before Donnie-Danny could get any further, the female deputy stepped in. “This isn’t going to get us anywhere, Danny. Santino has agreed to let Eddy talk to us, and he doesn’t have to do that. Let’s hear what Eddy has to say.” Something passed between Paez and the female deputy that Eddy couldn’t put his finger on, but it was clear they had history and knew each other outside this moment. In fact, it was like everyone in the room knew each other but fucking Eddy. He’d woken up in the middle of a conversation that everyone was having about him that he hadn’t been invited to join.
Still, Eddy wanted to say his piece. He wanted them to know he was sitting right here and not going quietly. “Yeah, I don’t remember any of that shit. Except for you trying to rip my fucking head off. Cheap shot, motherfucker.”
Danny started to stand and say something, maybe even do something, but was stopped by another look from the other deputy. Goddamn, she was a looker. Dark hair, dark eyes. Cheeks high and sharp. But both deputies looked tired. Hell, they looked the way he felt. The female deputy turned to Eddy, and although he thought . . . hoped . . . she was going to smile at him, let him know she was the reasonable one and things were okay between them, she didn’t. Not at all.
For the first time, Eddy was truly scared.
“Eddy, my name is America Reynosa, and it’s been a tough couple of days for all of us. Your attorney, Santino Paez, thought it would be a good idea that you talk to us, before things get out of hand. Before they get worse.”
“Like I said, I don’t remember hitting that son of a bitch over there. Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t.”
“This isn’t about that,” Deputy Reynosa said. “Not about hitting Deputy Ford. I wish that’s all it was. But it’s about the bodies, Eddy. The bodies.” She reached down somewhere beside her, out of his line of sight, and brought up a folder. She opened it and slid it across the table to him, avoiding the radio wrapped in plastic.
There were pictures there, a bunch of them.
Of bodies, floating in the river.
Oh fuck me . . .
And then Eddy remembered . . . all of it.
* * *
—
“I DIDN’T HAVE ANYTHING to do with that, nothing,” he said, putting his hands on the table to steady himself. There was dirt under his nails that looked like blood. He didn’t touch the pictures, though.
“But they were there, Eddy. Out back, on your property,” Deputy Ford said. He pointed at the photos. “Five of them. And we need an explanation, a reason. Right now, you’re the only one we’ve got.”
“Fuck that. Put me back in the clink for the drugs, or for hitting you. I’ll cop to all that and more. But that? No fucking way. I’m not a killer.”
“You almost killed me with a fucking skillet, Eddy.”
“That was completely different. I was high, out of my mind.”
Deputy Ford . . . Danny . . . took one of the pictures and turned it around to get a good look at it. Then he spun it back in Eddy’s direction. “Maybe you were high when you did this? Maybe you can only be high to do this. You know, like out of your mind.”
Eddy turned to his attorney, to Deputy Reynosa. Pleading. “I’m telling you, I know nothin’ about this. I saw it and it scared the shit out of me, too.”
Surprisingly it was Danny who nodded, softened first. “Okay, fair enough. I’m actually willing to buy that, Eddy. I saw you turn tail in the cane. I saw that look in your eyes when you ran up on me. You were surprised as anyone. Scared shitless, like you said. You weren’t faking that.”
“That’s right, thank you. Goddamn right I wasn’t. You see that, you know.” Eddy made a gesture at the pictures, trying to push them away.
Danny nodded again. “I do, Eddy. I don’t think you killed those men. Hell, one of them was barely that, just a kid. You didn’t kill them, but I do think you know them. Or did.”
Eddy opened his mouth, closed it again.
“I’m willing to forget that
you tried to break my skull if you talk to me about these men. That boy. I don’t want to put that on you. You help me and I’ll help you.”
Eddy looked away from the pictures. At his initial appearance before that prick Hildebrand, no one had said a goddamn word about a bunch of dead bodies floating in the river. “Charity know about this?”
“About the bodies? No, Eddy, she doesn’t,” Deputy Reynosa said, crossing her arms. “No one does, not yet. Not officially. But we can’t keep it quiet much longer.”
His attorney looked up, adding, “They only booked you on the assault on Deputy Ford, and the small amount of drugs in the trailer . . .”
Eddy cut him off. “That was personal-use shit. That was . . .”
Paez continued, as if Eddy hadn’t opened his mouth. “They can, and will, make an argument that it was not, if they have to. It’s leverage, Eddy. You sell drugs, that’s what you do. They’ll find fifty people who’ll say that’s all you do. As Deputy Ford pointed out, even without that, the assault itself is serious enough, given your prior record. They’re still processing the scene with the murder victims. You haven’t been charged with that. I saw an opportunity for you to help yourself before that happened. Your only opportunity. That’s why we’re all here.”
“No, these two here saw an opportunity to fuck me,” Eddy said, pointing at Danny and Deputy Reynosa. “And you’re helping ’em. God knows why. You’re supposed to be helping me.”
Danny tapped the table, getting Eddy’s attention. He leaned in close, right into Eddy’s face. His voice was low, somehow incredibly loud at the same time. “The sheriff has held the newspapers off, but he won’t be able to much longer. Whoever you’ve been working with is going to know. If Charity’s been involved with them, she’s going to know, too. Soon, everyone will. Then you’re no good to us, and then maybe Charity’s in danger. Someone’s going to want some answers, and if they can’t get to you, they sure in the hell will get to her.”
Eddy slumped back in his chair. “I think I hurt her the other day . . . Charity, I mean. It wasn’t her goddamn fault. I didn’t mean to do it, you know? Shit just gets fuzzy, all jumbled up sometimes. Like my head’s full of broken glass.”
Danny looked right at him. “Yeah, I get that, Eddy, I do.” And in that moment, Eddy believed him. Eddy could read him and knew it was true.
“But this has got to get clear, quick. If not for you, then for Charity. Don’t hurt her again,” Danny finished.
“I know, I know. So, look here, I’m telling you I’d remember something like that, all those people. But I don’t know who the fuck they are, and I sure don’t know who’d do that horrible shit to them. I don’t hang with people like that. Sorry.”
The room stayed silent, all eyes on Eddy.
“Goddamn,” Eddy breathed, to no one but himself. His breath was a lit match in his mouth.
“Goddamn is right, Eddy,” Danny agreed, and then, some silent signal passing between them, he turned to Deputy Reynosa, who reached down and pulled out a second folder. She opened it and took out a single picture. She held it up and then gave it to Eddy.
It was a picture of his kitchen, or what was left of it.
Before things had gotten too bad with the crank, he used to love to stand in that kitchen with the window open, facing the river. Listening to the sounds of the night and the water while drinking a cold beer, frying up some deer backstrap to mix in with some of that Patty Melt Hamburger Helper. He didn’t know how long it had been since he’d done that. Maybe months, maybe years. He knew that kitchen, but it was like someone else’s place now, even with the same old shit he recognized everywhere. Sometimes when he was using, it was like someone else had moved into his life, a real mean motherfucker pushing Eddy out of the way. Soon, there wouldn’t be any room left for him at all.
He tried to focus on the picture, wasn’t sure what he was supposed to be looking at, and then—another one of those moments of bright, hard clarity—he did.
He slid the picture back without a word, as Danny kept talking to him.
“Deputy Reynosa was taking photos of your place after our little altercation. Standard procedure. Evidence photos. All legal, with a search warrant and everything. You know what I’m talking about now, don’t you, Eddy?”
Eddy bit his lip. There was some good cop–bad cop shit going on here, but he was suddenly, brutally, too tired to care. After five, okay, maybe six days of being awake—of being pulled taut like a goddamn wire—he was worn out. So goddamn tired.
He laid his head down on the table.
He wondered where Charity was, and when he’d see her again.
Paez put a hand on his arm. “Don’t admit to something if there’s nothing to admit to. But if there is, Eddy, now is the time. If not, then we’re done here.”
Eddy pulled his head up, it was like lifting a mountain. His sweat left a stain, and he wiped it away and then pointed at the radio in the bag. The evidence bag, he now saw clearly. It had red stickers on it and was sealed up tight. “You took that out of my kitchen. It’s the one in the pictures.”
But Deputy Reynosa shook her head, while it was Danny’s turn to sit back. “No, Eddy, that’s the problem.” She picked up the bagged radio and handed it to Eddy. Just like the photos, he didn’t want to touch it, but this time, he did. It was heavy, too heavy, like his head, and there was some water staining the plastic, trapped inside. Maybe a mouthful. He was so thirsty he wanted to cut that bag open and take a good long drink. “That radio in your hands was taken from the river mud beneath the bodies we found. Just under the surface of the water. We think one of the men was carrying it. It’s not the one from your kitchen, but it’s the same. Identical.”
“Now you see the problem, Eddy. Your problem,” Danny said, softly. “What we’ve been trying to tell you here.” There was no anger there anymore, only disappointment. “Now I’m going to get you a Coke or a coffee or a glass of water. Hell, I’ll even get you a beer, because I think I’m going to need one, too. Whatever you want, because we’re going to start this all over again. We got all day.”
Paez’s hand left his arm, and although there were three other people in the room, Eddy was alone.
“And tomorrow’s a motherfucker,” Eddy said, catching Danny’s eye. Like when they’d shared that laugh outside his trailer, when Eddy had still been a free man.
“Yeah, it is, and for you, tomorrow’s too fucking late.”
Eddy Lee Rabbit put the radio back on the table and closed his eyes.
If he could sleep now, just lay his head down again for a few minutes, maybe he could think through this thing.
But instead, he opened his eyes and nodded yes.
FOURTEEN
Chris was having trouble finding District Attorney Royal “Roy” Moody, which wasn’t surprising. First, Royal didn’t like him and pretty much avoided him whenever he could, and second, he had two offices: one in Murfee and another in Nathan. That was the burden of being the DA for Big Bend, Terrell, Jeff Davis, and a couple of other West Texas counties—almost sixteen thousand square miles. A lot of land and not enough of you to go around to cover it all. This morning Moody wasn’t in either of his offices, but Chris finally tracked him down at the Whistle Stop Café in Nathan, enjoying breakfast with former Texas Ranger Bethel Turner. The two men looked up from their coffee when Chris walked in, and Bethel stood fast, his Stetson in his hand.
Bethel was in his fifties, and still looked every bit the Ranger. He was tall and broad-shouldered, with a touch of gray at his temples. His skin was permanently tanned, the way it darkened only for a West Texas native. In fact, standing there in his Wranglers and white shirt and Sam Browne belt and red tie with tiny silver Texas stars on it, he looked like the sort of actor you’d hire to play a Ranger in a movie. The only thing missing was the real silver-star badge. Chris remembered that Bethel may have done some advertising for the
Rangers a few years ago, some sort of TV commercial or some poster. Chris had nothing against Bethel, who was supposed to be decent enough, even if he was trying to take Chris’s job.
Royal Moody, on the other hand, was a whole other story. He was short, maybe five-foot-six, wearing his usual blue chambray shirt, bolero tie, black vest, and a dark blazer that was neither black nor blue but some other color in between, the color of a fresh bruise. He had his own Stetson Bent Tree straw hat on the table next to a half-finished plate of sunny-side-up eggs and ham. Chris had never warmed up to Royal—the feeling was more than mutual—but he’d afforded him and the office he held the respect he thought both were due, until recently. That’s when it became clear that Royal was not only going to back Bethel Turner in the coming election, but was actively helping fund the campaign against Chris.
There were probably rules somewhere against an elected official like Royal politicking while on the job, or using the resources of his office to help a candidate, but this was Texas, which made it politics as usual. You weren’t expected to whine about it or cry foul. If you wanted it bad enough, you were expected to find a way to win.
“Sorry to interrupt breakfast, gentlemen,” Chris said. He nodded at Bethel. “Bethel, hope you’re well. The signs everywhere look great, by the way. I also like that text message thing you’ve been putting out, ‘It’s OUR Big Bend,’ though some folks might take that as almost racist, or at least not very welcoming. I could be wrong about that. I hope I am.”
Bethel shook his head, running a hand over his brush cut. “Sorry, Sheriff, it’s just politics. You know.”
This Side of Night Page 12
