by Tina Whittle
“How do you know?”
“Because there was no laundry in the hamper. And because I could see the outline of their radios. And because they were armed. Also there’s a patrol car on Waters as we turned in, supposedly on traffic duty, but it’s not. Please don’t ask me how I know this, I just do. This entire scenario was a set-up.”
“Why me?”
“Not you. Jefferson. I doubt you were the intended target, though you became one quickly.” He checked the rear-view mirror. “The call Jefferson got was a pretext. There was no emergency. The authorities were hoping Jefferson would show up because, most probably, they have a warrant for his arrest and can’t find him.”
“So it was a trap? They got us all worked up for nothing?”
He nodded curtly, his jaw tight. He took the next right at almost full speed, a whiplash maneuver. I grabbed the door handle, braced against the dashboard.
“You’re mad,” I said.
“I am.”
“At me?”
He shot me a look. “Of course not. I’m mad at whoever authorized this. It’s unethical, possibly counter-protocol.”
Well, well, well. This was a new thing. Trey got pissed off about a lot of things, but this was the first time I’d seen him cut his temper on his fellow boys in blue.
“So this isn’t procedure?”
“Of course not.”
“You never staked out a funeral, surveilled a wedding?”
A muscle in his jaw ticced. “Those are different situations entirely.”
I examined him closely. Yep, mad, but something else too. Violated. Cops weren’t supposed to do stuff like this, not to me, because doing it to me was like doing it to him. He was taking this personally.
“Do you think they heard?” I said.
“Heard what?”
“Me talking to Boone.”
“Probably. Did you mention Jefferson’s whereabouts?”
I thought back. “No.”
“Then they’ll be waiting for him at Boone’s place.”
He took the next right at the same breakneck speed, and the Camaro complained. It was made for hauling ass, not agility runs. I rested my hand on his shoulder, an old trick I’d learned from Garrity to bring him down. To my relief, he exhaled in a burst, and the speedometer eased back to legal limits.
I kept my hand on him anyway. “But Jefferson said he had nothing to do with John’s disappearance. He was telling the truth. You said so.”
“Savannah Metro doesn’t know that. And the warrant could be for something else. And it could be valid, regardless of its method of execution.”
“That’s too many could-be’s for my taste.”
“Also, I am not infallible. I could be—”
“There you go could-being again.”
Trey didn’t argue. He flexed his fingers and retook the wheel. I felt the same way, like my anchor line had gotten cut. Why was I so protective of Jefferson suddenly? Not because he’d changed—he was still the racist, fear-mongering redneck he’d always been. So he’d had a cross burned on his lawn? Big deal. That was chickens coming home to roost. So he was freaked about potential violence against his family? More chickens making their way back home. So the legitimate family business was federal property, and he could lose his home, and his daddy was sick, and now there was probably a warrant for his arrest…
“If they find him, he’ll go straight to processing at the detention center. Where Jasper is.”
Trey’s eyes were tight. “Yes. Which is a problematic scenario.”
“That’s an understatement.”
I was torn. Should I let Jefferson know, and perhaps tip off a murderer? Should I keep quiet, and let the unethical pack of cops throw him into the same pit as Jasper, who seemed to have allies in and out and everywhere? Was one way right and one way wrong? Was one way useful?
I flopped back against the seat. “So now what?”
“Now we go back to the hotel.”
“And then what?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I really don’t.”
Chapter Thirty-nine
Valet parking was full, so Trey parked on the street a few blocks up from the DeSoto. I’d called Jefferson on the way back from the hospital, to tell him that his father wasn’t really at death’s door, that I’d checked on him myself. He’d immediately figured out the ruse without my having to say a single word about it, which spared me the decision or any debate with Trey. Although judging from Trey’s simmer, he might have let me warn Jefferson anyway.
I tugged at his sleeve. “Come on. Let’s go upstairs. We can check and see if there really is a warrant out for Jefferson.”
Trey made a noise of assent, but still didn’t budge. The rain had finally arrived, and was already beating a steady rhythm on the roof of the car. It was soothing, and I wanted to put my seat back and listen to it patter and roar. But that was a luxury I didn’t have any longer.
I started gathering my things, clearing out the backseat before we left the car at the meter. It was a riotous mess. I decided to leave the heavy box of shop pamphlets there and started shoving everything else into a plastic bag—my CDs, muddy sneakers, a dirty rolled-up tee shirt.
I frowned as soon as my fingers wrapped around the fabric. A tee shirt shouldn’t have been heavy. I unwrapped it, and I felt the blood drain from my head. “Oh fuck.”
“What?”
I whipped back around. “There’s a gun back there.”
“Did you say—”
“Handgun, a .45. Not mine. Wrapped in a dirty tee shirt. Which is mine.”
Trey stared at me, then unfastened his seatbelt and leaned into the backseat. He stayed that way for fifteen, twenty seconds. Then he righted himself and put both hands on the steering wheel.
“Told you so,” I said.
He turned to me. “Did you—?”
“Touch it? Yep. Plus that shirt is the one I was wearing Friday afternoon, so it’s got my skin cells all over it. And now gunshot residue and gun oil and—”
“Did you recognize it?”
“No. But I bet it matches those shells I found at John’s trailer. Which means I am being set up.”
“When was the last time you looked in the backseat and didn’t see the gun?”
I stared at the ceiling, trying to remember. “Last night maybe, when we parked it? But I was a mess last night. Did you check?”
“Not thoroughly. But your backseat is somewhat…”
“I know.”
“Have you noticed anyone following you?”
“I didn’t even notice you. Did you notice anyone following me? Or tampering with my car?”
“Unfortunately, no.” He pulled a piece of paper from his pocket, along with a pen. “Here. Write down as specifically as you can where you went, how long you stayed, and who might have had access to your car since you arrived. I want to check something.”
He got out of the car and went around back. I started writing. There was Billie’s, the hospital, the trailer, Bay Street. Twice at the detention center, where I’d seen Ivy and Lovett and Finn and Shane. But there were tons of cameras there, plus Trey had been watching my car the second time. What about the mom and pop café where he cut his sandwich into triangles and I worried about his sanity? Maybe. Then I’d parked it with the hotel’s valet service while we drove the Ferrari around—the valet lot seemed secure, but it was actually a quick elevator ride from regular parking, not at all protected. Captain Lou’s, whose dinky dirt parking afforded ample unsupervised opportunity to slim-jim my doors open and stuff a plant gun in the backseat. And of course Boone’s place. It was unlikely an outsider could have gotten through those gates, but anybody on the inside could have. Cheyanne? Jefferson? And then the storage unit, where we knew Ivy had been, and then back to the hospital…
; Dammit, there were too many opportunities to narrow it down.
Trey got back in the car, looking even more shell-shocked. “Your bumper has a GPS device attached.”
“Somebody’s been tracking me. Somebody who’s not you.”
“Correct.”
I kicked at the door, kicked again. “This is all Jasper’s doing! He wants me in the detention center! God knows what other evidence he’s planted!”
“Tai—”
“There could be a damn body in our hotel room for all we know! Somebody calling 911 right this very second, while we sit here twiddling our thumbs! And you saw those cops at the hospital. They’re jonesing for an arrest, and I’ll be a silver platter suspect when they see this.”
Trey stared straight ahead. He was thinking, hard, but nothing was coming. I knew what he was not saying—that we had to call the police, that we’d be tampering with evidence and setting ourselves up for legal complications down the road if we didn’t—and I waited, waited to see if his exquisitely tuned brain could come up with some other way to deal with this.
He shook his head, still not looking at me. “We have to report this.”
“Not we. You. And you can call them in a minute. But I’m not going to be here when they arrive.”
He looked at me as if I were insane. “No—”
“Listen to me. If this is Jasper’s doing—and all the evidence suggests it is—then I’m doomed the second they take me in. They’re already suspicious because I showed up at the hospital. But with this?” I jerked my thumb backwards. “They have enough to arrest and charge me. And stick me in a cell. Where I am fair game for whoever he’s got on the inside. Where even you can’t protect me.”
He swallowed hard. “You’ll make bail quickly.”
“Not before they put me in a holding cell with god-only-knows how many other people.”
“You can request—”
“I won’t get it.”
“Stop it! Stop arguing, stop…just stop!”
He leaned forward and rested his forehead against the steering wheel. He was breathing hard, agitated. I put my hand on his back, and I could feel the rise and fall of his lungs under muscles tight like a snare drum.
“They could be coming any second now. And I can’t run from the law, I know that, but I can make myself very hard to find, for a little while anyway. While you figure out what’s going on.”
He kept his head down, but I felt something ripple through him. Resignation maybe. Anger possibly. His body never lied, and he was at war in there, in his head, in his heart.
His voice was flat. “We have no evidence that a warrant has been taken out for you, or that anyone has reported that you have this weapon.”
I shook my head. “That doesn’t matter, it’s—”
“It matters because if you or I had knowledge of such, then for you to leave now would be evasion of questioning and lawful custody, and it would be grounds for your immediate arrest and detention. Mine as well, for aiding and abetting.” He sat up, staring over the dashboard. “But we don’t know these things.”
I froze in my seat. “Go on.”
“You should go to the nearest police station and explain.”
I nodded warily. “I should.”
“I’m officially telling you to do that while I stay here and watch your car to prevent further tampering.” He looked straight ahead, the words coming like a recitation. “You should not attempt to evade law enforcement. They will be talking with everyone you know here in Savannah, including me.”
I got a glimmer of where he was going with this. “Except that I might be in Atlanta. Or Jacksonville. You don’t know.”
“No. I do not. I’ll be sure to tell them that when they ask. Because they will.”
I suddenly realized why he wasn’t looking at me—he didn’t want to know if I was lying because he knew he’d have to report exactly what he knew, exactly what I’d said, to whoever showed up when he called. He could only step so far over that line, and lying to the authorities was beyond him.
He continued in a monotone. “Should an officer try to talk with you, do not run. Do not hide. Do not reach for your phone or your bag or your keys. Do not reach into your pockets. Do not go into another room, not even if you need to get a change of clothes. Unless we have a search warrant in addition to the arrest warrant, we’re only allowed to search your person and your wingspan.”
He’d shifted to “we” and hadn’t even noticed. He was aligning himself on the other side of the blue line. Except for the part of him that was telling me how to outwit his own kind.
“What is my wingspan?” I said.
“Fingertip to fingertip. If you have your gun, hold your hands up and away from your body, palms facing forward, and announce to the officer that you are armed, then tell them exactly where you’re keeping it. Do not reach for it yourself.”
I bit my lip. Damn it, no crying. No throwing up. None of that.
“I got it,” I said.
“Should you be detained, say only ‘I wish to remain silent. I want a lawyer.’ You will probably be wanted for questioning at first, a person of interest BOLO. Should they eventually issue an arrest warrant, however…” His voice cracked, and he looked at me finally, fierce now. “I don’t know how to do this, I don’t…Tai.”
I moved to wrap my arms around him, but he flinched away from my touch. And that almost broke me, almost undid me utterly.
He shook off the emotion, steadying himself again. “If you’re going to go, you have to go now, and quickly.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to call this in. And then I’m going to wait here while they file the report. I’ll tell them only what you’ve told me.”
He was back to “them” again, on the other side once more. Suddenly I understood exactly what it was like for him to watch me leave, over and over again, right when it was the last thing I wanted to understand. I ached to hold him one more time, assure him I’d be okay, that he’d be okay. But his composure was fragile, and so was mine, and somewhere an invisible clock was ticking.
“I’m gonna be fine,” I said. “I promise.”
I took a deep breath. Straightened my shoulders. Then I got out, dragged my bag over one shoulder, and left without looking back.
Chapter Forty
I got a rain poncho at the first kiosk I saw and spent the rest of the daylight hours moving from place to place, sticking to venues where people could count on sitting alone and quiet without being disturbed. I walked the side roads and squares with my head ducked and hands shoved in my pockets, one of hundreds of similarly dressed tourists, any second expecting blue lights and the wail of sirens. Nobody stopped me, though, and once night settled in, I made my way down to River Street.
I waited until Train put out the CLOSED sign, then I went around and knocked on his back door. I heard the latch unbolt, and the sharp creaking snap of rain-swollen wood.
Train stuck his head out. “Tai?”
“Yeah. It’s me.” I lowered the rain hood and shook out my hair. “Any room at the inn?”
***
Thirty minutes later, I was warm and dry on Train’s sofa, safely ensconced in his secret sanctuary. This ten-by-ten back room served as a combination office, storage closet, and haven of respite for the weary and wounded, for those with no place else to go except back to whatever godforsaken hell they’d managed to escape from.
Taking an inventory was short work since I’d walked away with my bag, my gun, and the clothes on my back. I had twenty-seven dollars in cash and one credit card that I couldn’t use, because if the police were tracking me, they’d be looking for that. I’d left my cell phone in my car so no one could trace me that way either.
I picked up my wallet and pulled out the card that had come with the roses, the one with Trey’s s
ignature on it. Seeing his name there was a comfort, a connection once removed. I propped it on the side table like a miniature work of art.
Train sat in a desk chair opposite me, his takeout container open on his lap. He’d brought us supper, catfish po’ boys from the restaurant two doors down. While he ate, he studied me over his reading glasses, looking for bruises, for track marks, for the bodily evidence of whatever might have brought me to his door. He counseled the battered and abused, the terrified and the lonesome. He saw through facades as if they were transparent plastic curtains.
“Tai—”
“Don’t ask. You need deniable plausibility.”
He managed a smile. “You mean plausible deniability.”
“Whatever. I’m too tired to think straight.”
Train took a long pull on his orange soda. “This have anything to do with your cousin Jefferson getting arrested?”
I almost dropped my french fry. “Where did you hear that?”
“I saw it on the news. They found him at his in-laws’ house in some little podunk corner of Kentucky. Charged him with some firearms violations and breaking conditions of probation. Currently incarcerated in the county jail there, awaiting transport to the Chatham County Detention Center.”
“His wife and kids?”
Train shrugged. “Still there, as far as I know. You said that was the whole reason he went to Kentucky, right? To keep his family out of harm’s way?”
“Yeah. But now he’s headed to one of the most dangerous places in Chatham County.”
“Yeah. Eventually. Once they get transport arranged.” Train wiped his mouth, leaned forward. “I know the drill, Tai. So I don’t want to know if there’s a warrant out for you too. You’ve got a safe place here, no matter what. But your family has a reputation for dark deeds of a non-Christian nature. And if you are caught up in that—”
“You know better.”
“That’s not what I mean. I mean, is it the Klan looking for you? A bunch of drug dealers? The cops?”
I put down my sandwich. “All of the above, most likely. Because I am being framed, probably for murder. Jasper’s got men on the outside and on the inside, and if I go in, I’m dead meat. There’s one body that we know of, plus a quarter million in stolen money, which is probably why John is missing, because either he took it, or somebody took it from him, or somebody thought he had it—”
