Burn It Up

by Cara McKenna

  Casey could only stare at his friend, feeling struck.

  “Why me?” Miah asked, the rage gone from his voice.

  “They said you were in the way. That’s all they told me, I swear. They said, ‘We need him out of the way.’”

  “Out of the way of what?”

  “I don’t know, I don’t know. They just told me, ‘Get rid of him.’”

  “What’d they give you? Fucking money?”

  “I got busted for selling. They paid my bail. I was gonna get ten years, but they told me they’d get me off if I helped them out.”

  That gave Casey pause. Who the fuck would have the power to make that promise? A crooked judge, a lawyer? Whoever’d brought the charges? What reason would anybody in such a position have to want Miah dead? Unless it had simply been an empty promise, used to manipulate this addled burnout . . .

  “When they told me what they wanted in return,” Bean went on, “I said I couldn’t. I couldn’t do that. But then they threatened to hurt my wife.” He began gasping, the sounds of a panic attack closing in.

  “Who? Fucking who?” Miah shouted.

  When the man didn’t answer, Miah shot to his feet and kicked him square in the ribs. Casey scrambled to standing and pulled him back while Bean wheezed and clutched his middle. “You can’t kill him.”

  “Why the fuck not?” Miah bellowed, his entire body thrashing in Casey’s arms. “He meant to do the same to me! He fucking killed my dad!”

  Casey managed to wrestle Miah to the dirt, pinning him on his belly as he swore and bucked. Bean was whimpering now, maybe even crying, voice growing fainter by the second, words sounding wet from more than tears, as though he were choking on something.

  “You kill him,” Casey told Miah, right in his ear, “and we never find out who hired him, you got that? You kill him and the person who wanted you fucking dead walks away from all this. Now this motherfucker’s fucking choking or some shit, so I’m gonna let you up, and I’m gonna call nine-one-one, and you’re not gonna touch him, you got that? We’re gonna let the authorities take him, and they’ll get you some answers. But you do not fucking touch him, you understand me? Your mom needs you too fucking bad right now for you to mess this shit up.”

  Miah went still. His face was jammed to one side, flushed red from the rage and the dust, equally. He didn’t reply, but Casey had no choice but to take his body language as a truce. He stood, eyeing Miah as he pulled his phone out and dialed the digits. Miah sat up, facing away from Casey and the man on the ground, and hugged his knees.

  “Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?”

  “I need an ambulance, and the police. There’s a guy on the ground—he’s been shot and I think he’s on drugs. He tried to kill my friend,” Casey said, realizing with a chill that it wasn’t merely a fib to imply self-defense. It was true.

  The operator demanded the location and Casey gave it, staying on the line, answering questions until he was told that the authorities were on the way. He checked on Bean and found him breathing, if faintly, sounding as though he had a reed in his throat.

  “Don’t you dare fucking die, asshole. You’ve got too much shit to answer for.” Casey didn’t know a ton about first aid, but decided to leave him on his side, thinking it’d keep him from choking to death on all the shit leaking from his lips. There was more blood on the ground—a small pool of it, but not enough to equal a major artery, he imagined.

  “Miah, gimme your knife.”

  Miah didn’t respond, so Casey got up and forcibly took the thing, unclipping it from Miah’s belt. He ripped Bean’s pant leg open, wincing at the wound. It didn’t look deep, but it was bleeding pretty bad, soaking his jeans.

  Casey got his own hoodie off and tied it twice around Bean’s thigh, tight. His pistol was probably evident through his shirt, but the thing was registered and he had a concealed-carry permit. He didn’t relish the cops finding it, but at least he wouldn’t get charged.

  As the waiting commenced and his role as the coolheaded party ebbed, Casey felt his own rage rising inside.

  Don Church was dead.

  The man who’d taught Casey how to ride a horse and shoot a rifle. Who’d given him little tastes now and then of what a father was supposed to be like—calling him a dumb-ass and slapping him upside the head once when he’d been about twelve, penance for riling one of the stock horses. The animal could have kicked him, could’ve broken his skull, but you didn’t consider that shit at that age. Casey had been hit by his own dad a few times before the guy had taken off, but this had been different. More startling, coming from a friend’s father. Way more humbling, knowing he’d been called out for a stupid move, that he’d been traded a smack in place of a potentially fatal hoof to the head. More humiliating, too, because he’d always looked up to Don Church, thinking the guy was about as cool as dads came. As cool as a cowboy from a western. He’d grown up a little that day.

  These past few months, Casey had been wanting to feel like someone important, like a man who mattered. He’d thought that his part in saving the bar was the way to achieve that, and it wasn’t off the mark . . . but there was no more significant thing a man could be than a father, was there? Whether you were Don Church or Tom Grossier, the choices you made as a father could change people profoundly, for better or worse. Don had done so much good, for so many people.

  Now he’s gone.

  He’d never meet Miah’s future kids, or kiss his wife again, or see his land or his animals, or drive down Station Street with his tanned arm draped along the open window, raising his hand at every person he passed. He was ten times more recognizable than the mayor—a hundred times more respected.

  Or he used to be. Past tense.

  Casey glanced at Chris Bean, lying nearly still save for the faintest rise and fall of his ribs, silent except for that eerie whistling breath. All because of you, Casey thought, and felt his muscles tensing, wanting to kick and hit and strangle, to reach for his gun and finish the fucking job.

  Not only because of him, he reminded himself. Bean was the bullet. You could curse the bullet all you wanted, but where would that get you, in the end? It was the hand around the grip and the finger on the trigger that mattered. The brain that gave the order to squeeze.

  “You better fucking live,” he muttered, squinting at Bean. “You just better hope you fucking live.”

  • • •

  Bean did live, but not for long.

  Long enough to die in the back of the ambulance from circulatory shock—a combination of stress and the drugs in his system, the news later reported—but not long enough to get questioned by the police or shed any more light on the tragedy now gripping Fortuity.

  All told, Miah and Casey had spent about six hours being questioned by the authorities. Casey had confessed that he’d trespassed and shown them the lighter. He might get a fine for disturbing a crime scene, but both their firearms were legit. Miah had shot Bean, and from behind, so self-defense was no excuse. Still, the shot hadn’t killed him—the drugs had—and Miah had ultimately been released. If he did face criminal charges, it’d be hard to make them stick, given the circumstances; Don Church had been a monumental figure in the county, and it was unlikely any jury of Miah’s peers would want to see him punished for his part in turning his father’s accidental death case into an arson investigation and possible homicide.

  The autopsy had found two bullets in Don’s back—one in his shoulder, one in his spine, both shot from medium range. They were 9mm, and their casings matched those from the warnings aimed at Jason on Friday night. Unusual marks on the slugs found in Don’s body suggested a silencer.

  If the circumstances were merciful, that shot to the spine meant maybe Don had died quickly, never having lived to suffer the fire.

  It was Thursday morning, and Miah looked up from his laptop at the sound of the doorbell. He’d been wading through e-mails, business and personal alike, and trying not to drown in the process. This was the third morning
he’d woken to realize his father was dead, and though the shock of it was fading, the pain hadn’t ebbed a jot.

  He shouted, “I got it,” in case his mother had been poised to interrupt whatever she was doing in the office. He headed for the front door.

  Not condolences, he prayed as he closed his hand around the knob. He couldn’t take any more kind words, any more sad faces, any more goddamn casseroles. The funeral was set for Sunday, and he’d need all the stamina he could muster just to survive it.

  He opened the door, finding his wish had been granted. But the visitor was still a touch troubling.

  It was an official, dressed in the Sheriff’s Department’s khaki pants and jacket, a silver six-cornered star pinned above her left breast and a black leather messenger-type bag strapped across her modest chest. In light of Bean saying Miah had been the intended target of those bullets, he’d been offered a bodyguard, but declined. He felt suffocated as it was, and the authorities posted around the property felt like protection enough.

  This officer was tallish, slim, with strikingly good posture. Her skin was dark brown, hair pulled into a ponytail and exploding at the back of her head in a thousand tight little curls. She looked about thirty, and Miah had seen her before—he was sure of it. But he hadn’t known the BCSD to have anyone like her in their ranks. Hell, there was probably only a handful of African Americans in all of Brush County. Kind of tough to miss.

  “Mr. Church, good morning. I’m Deputy Ritchey,” she said, and he placed her by her firm, calm voice in an instant. The uniform had thrown him.

  “You were here with the fire crew.”

  She nodded. “I’m a volunteer, when I’m off duty.” She offered a cool hand, and Miah shook it.

  “You probably know my name already,” he said.

  She nodded. “Jeremiah.”

  “Miah’s fine.”

  “So is Nicki,” she said with a little smile.

  “Is this to do with the investigation?”

  “No, that’s in the detectives’ hands. I’m just a patrol deputy.”

  “Oh.” His shoulders sank. He’d kill for any hint that someone was making progress in figuring out who’d hired Chris Bean. Wild, racing theories haunted him at night when he tried to sleep, but none felt right. Something was always missing—a motive big enough to warrant murder. Miah had given the names and contact details of the property vultures to the BCSD, on the off chance they might be linked. Still, it was all so muddy and desperate just now, and waiting was torture. If he didn’t have a reeling business to keep afloat, he’d be out there himself, looking for answers. The inactivity left him feeling helpless, neutered.

  “Can I help you with something?” he asked the deputy.

  She slid her bag around to her front and opened its flap, pulling out a thick, quart-sized black plastic bag. “The forensics team has released some items from the arson investigation. Your dad’s things, we guessed. I wanted to give them to you. If you’d like them, that is.”

  He stared at the bag, heart twisting, and he felt tears rising, contorting his face. “What sorts of things?”

  “A pocketknife, and a belt buckle, and a watch.”

  His breath was gone, sucked from his chest. His legs felt funny and apt to give, and he sank awkwardly onto the bench. The deputy did the same, looking concerned.

  He reached for the bag with a shaking hand, and the weight of it struck like a battering ram, knocking him hard in the heart, doubling him over. He felt a kind hand on his back, between his shoulder blades. It scrunched his shirt softly a few times, then rubbed.

  “I’m so sorry for your loss,” the deputy said. She sounded like she meant it, too, not like she was simply reading from the script.

  Miah looked up enough to meet her eyes and give her permission to take her hand back. She scooted an inch or two farther down the bench, linking her fingers between her knees.

  “I asked to come, to bring you his things,” she said. “I lost my dad, too. He was a cop, back in Chicago.”

  “When?” Miah asked. “When did you lose him, I mean?” He was breathing quick, feeling like so much hinged on her answer.

  “I was twenty-five, so almost six years ago.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry to hear that. You’re a long way from Chicago,” he added.

  “Sometimes people need a change of scenery,” she said with a smile.

  “Your dad . . . Was he . . .” He trailed off, but she read his mind.

  She nodded. “He was shot.”

  “How do . . . Does it ever stop feeling like this?” he asked, voice breaking. “How did you ever even manage to keep going, after?”

  “I had to,” she said. “For my son.”

  “Oh.”

  Her gaze was soft, her eyes dark brown and looking infinitely patient. A small comfort. “You must have people who still need you, Miah. Your mother?”

  He nodded, a little bit of the steel returning to his spine. “My mother.”

  “Nobody’s saying you need to be strong right now,” she told him, and for some reason those words cut straight down to the bone. He started crying—loud and ugly and out of control—hugging his own arms, hurting like his heart was about to rip in two.

  The deputy put her hand on his knee, squeezing. “You don’t have to be strong,” she repeated. “You just have to be. Just have to get up every morning, be with your mom, and take turns with her day to day, being the one with their shit together, you know?”

  He didn’t know, not yet. But it seemed he’d find out soon.

  “It will stop feeling like this,” she told him. “It won’t ever stop hurting, but it won’t always feel like this. You’ll always have the memory. A scar. But the wound will heal.”

  He looked to the bag, which had fallen to the floor between his feet. He picked it up, held it out. “I’m not ready for this.”

  She accepted it. “Tell me where I can leave it, for when you decide you are ready.”

  He thought about it. “In the kitchen, just around the corner. On top of the hutch.”

  She disappeared for a few moments, then returned and took her seat once more. “Now, is there anything I can do? For you or your mother?”

  He shook his head. “No, we’ll be okay.”

  Another gentle smile. “It’s okay if you’re not, for a little while.”

  Tears stung anew, but he wiped them away with the back of his hand.

  “I’ll give you my card,” she said, reaching into her breast pocket. “In case you think of anything.”

  He took it. “Thanks.”

  “I can see myself out,” she said, poised to stand.

  “Wait.”

  She met his eyes, settled back down with her hands clasped patiently on her thighs.

  “Did you know Alex?” he asked her. “Alex Dunn?”

  She shook her head. “That was before my time. I was transferred shortly after he passed.”

  Something cold dropped into Miah’s stomach. “Oh. Were you his replacement?”

  “It’s not that simple. A lot of people got shifted around after your sheriff was arrested. But I suppose I was, in a way. You knew him?” she asked. “Alex?”

  “Since we were kids.”

  “His colleagues have only good things to say about him,” she offered.

  Miah nodded. For all Alex’s flaws, he’d been an excellent deputy. He looked down, feeling exhausted and strange and a little high. “What the fuck’s happening to this town?” he asked the hallway at large.

  “Change,” the deputy—Nicki—said.

  “Not for the better,” he muttered.

  She didn’t reply. Miah glanced up, finding a sad smile on her face.

  “Thanks,” he said, and tried to let the bitterness go.

  “My job,” she said, standing. Miah did the same. “You take care of yourself. And your mother. She’ll try to do all the healing for the both of you. But you step in and take over when you’re up to it, okay? Us mamas, sometimes we need our sons
to fill their father’s shoes. But only when you’re up for it.”

  He nodded, though filling his father’s shoes . . . He doubted he could ever fit in them. His dad’s steps had felt as long and wide as canyons since he’d been a tiny kid. Looking like the man didn’t make Miah his equal. “How old is your son?” he asked the deputy.

  “Nine.”

  “He ever have to be the man of the house?”

  She smiled deeper, eyes crinkling. “More often than I care to admit. But he does me proud, same as you’ll do for your own mother.”

  He tried to smile back, not feeling so sure.

  “Take care, Miah.” And she turned once more and opened the door, closed it softly behind her.

  Chapter 28

  Casey, Vince, and Miah were in the Churches’ den watching the noon KBCN broadcast later that day, Don’s death still dominating the headlines, no shock. Vince clicked off the TV as yet another uninformative report wrapped, tossing the remote to the next couch cushion and rubbing his face. The gesture said exactly what Casey was feeling. It’s another fucking murder mystery in Fortuity, then, is it? But of course now was a time to keep one’s frustration and anger to oneself. The tone of the room was Miah’s to set, after all.

  The man was quiet, sitting in the rocker, leaning forward with his forearms on his knees, staring at the now-dark screen. His expression was stony. He looked ancient, with circles under his eyes and the drawn cheeks of a man who hadn’t eaten or drunk anything in days. But there was life in those eyes again, Casey thought. Determination or strength or at least anger, whereas last night there’d been nothing but blankness.

  The floorboards overhead creaked now and then, the sounds of Abilene gathering up her and the baby’s things. She was going to move out. She’d told Casey the previous morning. Rightly, she wanted to give Miah and Christine the space to deal with the brewing investigation, as well as their grief.

  She’d talked to Raina and Duncan and would be staying in the guest room of their apartment above the bar until she found her own place.

  She was treating Casey kindly. Being friendly, even, though there was sadness weighing down the edges of their conversations. Regret. Maybe a little taste of the mourning now suffusing the farmhouse, though for the death of their romance as well as that of a good man.