Last Ragged Breath

by Julia Keller

  “Wow,” Rhonda said. “I had no idea that Carolyn Runyon was in love with Hackel.”

  “She wasn’t.”

  Her eyes widened. “But you said in there that—”

  “She told the truth about one thing. It really is all about business for her.” Bell couldn’t remember the last time she’d been this tired. She was debating internally with herself about which should come first: a hot soaky bath or a cold Rolling Rock or about a year of sleep. Right now, sleep was the clear favorite.

  “She used Ed Hackel for sex,” Bell went on. “She’d done it before with other men on her staff. It didn’t mean anything to her. No more than it means to powerful men who do the same thing with female employees. Hackel was a little below her usual standard, looks-wise. Not exactly Prince Charming. But he was handy.”

  “So why were you so insistent that it was all about love? And jealousy?”

  “Everybody’s got a story. And if somebody tries to tell a different one, the wrong one, we do whatever we can to correct it. Can’t help ourselves. It’s the deepest instinct we have—preserving our story. There was nothing I could have said to Carolyn Runyon tonight to make her talk—except to get her story wrong. After that, I knew I wouldn’t be able to shut her up. I turned her into an object of pity. And she had to set me straight. Had to. Because in the end, that’s all any of us really have—our story.”

  Rhonda looked uncertain. “Hard to believe she’d kill a man—and frame another—for some land.”

  “It’s not just land. It’s her life. Without Royce Dillard’s property, she’ll lose everything. There was no other way. Nothing else would work. Dillard was never going to sell—unless he was forced to. Unless he was backed up against a wall—by a murder conviction and a series of expensive appeals. He’d do anything to get back to his dogs.” Bell smiled briefly, thinking about Royce’s dogs, and about the ride she and Rhonda had taken that cold day, returning from his property. Cages rattling in the back of the Explorer. One of the cages had held Goldie.

  “That,” Bell said, “is why Diana was so distraught by the idea that he’d cut a deal with us. That’s why she accosted me on the street that day, playing the grieving-widow-seeking-justice card. If Dillard made a deal, if he didn’t need money for his appeals, there’d be no reason for him to sell his land to Mountain Magic. They’d be right back where they started.”

  “Why didn’t they just kill Royce? Buy the land from his estate?”

  “That estate could’ve been tied up in probate for years. Meanwhile, all those trucks and backhoes would be sitting there, rusting away, eating up capital. Not to mention the cost of construction materials. Salaries for the crew. No, she needed a better plan. A faster one. And an expendable employee to make it happen.”

  “Hackel.”

  “Yes. Hackel.”

  It could not happen right now—Pam Harrison was too busy with the new prisoners—but at some point, Bell knew, she and the sheriff would talk about this night, process it, and when they did, Bell would look into her colleague’s eyes and hope she saw there what she needed to see: an acknowledgement of the fact that sometimes sheriffs got it wrong. Sometimes prosecutors got it wrong. And when they got it wrong, either one or both of them, they needed to do their damnedest to make it right. They had to find the truth, even as the cold mechanics they had set into motion continued the grinding, relentless journey toward a thing called justice—the human version of it, anyway, which, despite their best efforts, bore only the faintest, flimsiest likeness to the divine kind.

  As her weariness had increased, Bell began to feel the soft call of her own story, not as a list of events but as something that came back to her in bits and flashes, sounds and colors: Orphan girl. Child of the hills. Violence and loss. Then: Light. Books. Love. The return to this town, these people.

  “Carolyn Runyon,” Bell said, “couldn’t stand the idea that I’d gotten her story wrong—which would mean I’d gotten her wrong. We’ll fight to the death—we’ll even give up our lives—to protect our story.”

  * * *

  Bell stood at the top of the great gray sweep of steps that spread from the courthouse door to the dark sidewalk below. It was almost midnight now, arrests made, her colleagues gone home. The town was still. The air was cold, but that didn’t matter; the cold revived her, and it made the air feel fresh and filled with promise, like a newly minted coin.

  She retrieved the car keys from her purse. She held them in her fist, mind stuck on the memory of Diana’s face, a face clotted with hate. Carolyn’s face had been different: It was sharpened like an animal’s when it is under duress, keen with calculation.

  And there he was.

  Clay Meckling.

  He stood at the bottom of the steps. At first, she wasn’t sure it was really him. For one thing, clouds blocked much of the light from the moon, and it was damned hard to see anything at all. For another, a lot of men in Acker’s Gap fit his general description: tall and rawboned, blond hair cut so close to the scalp that its actual color was hard to discern even in daylight. Diffident grin. Boots and jeans. Hip-length Carhartt jacket.

  But for all that, she knew. Yes. It was him.

  “Hey,” she said. Her fatigue vanished and her body suddenly felt light, unbelievably light, her bones like balsa wood, and she was fairly sure she could’ve risen a few inches off the earth with no problem whatsoever. She chalked it up to lack of sleep.

  That had to be it.

  “Sorry to ambush you like this,” Clay said. At first he had to look up at her, standing as she was on the top step, but she started down—a steady pace, not hasty, so as not to appear too eager—and then they were standing on the same ground, and close. “Wanted to call, but you’re in the middle of a case. Know better than to bother you. I was coming around to see if your office light was on. Figured I’d watch it for a little while, then be on my way.”

  “Just wrapped things up,” she said.

  And because he knew her, he didn’t question the fact that she was leaving the courthouse at 11:37 P.M.

  “Mary Sue called me,” Clay said. “Says Nick needs help. I couldn’t say no. Not after what the man’s done for me—and done for my family. And for this town. So I drove straight through. Maybe while I’m back here—I mean, if it sounds okay to you—I thought we could spend some time together and—”

  “I’ve really missed you, Clay.” The phrase wasn’t right—it didn’t begin to suggest what she felt for this man, the intensity of it, the passion for him that had never abated—but it would have to do for now. She knew what people had said about her and Clay and would say again now, the crude references to cougars and to The Graduate, all the innuendoes. She didn’t give a damn.

  “Same here.” He looked around the black, bleak, narrow streets, hands stowed in the back pockets of his jeans, all at once a bit embarrassed. “You’re tired,” he said. “I’m keeping you.”

  “Look pretty beat yourself. What is it—a ten-, eleven-hour drive from Boston?”

  “Something like that. Okay, so, how about tomorrow? Breakfast at JP’s, first thing?”

  She started to say yes. Then she shook her head. “Not first thing. I’ve got responsibilities at home. But later in the morning—absolutely.”

  “Responsibilities?” He was suddenly concerned. Was she involved with someone?

  “Name’s Goldie,” Bell said. “Gets her morning walk, no matter what.”

  Chapter Forty

  There was paperwork; there was always paperwork. It would be many hours before the charges against Royce Dillard were officially dropped. Judge Barbour would listen to the prosecution’s explanation and then make a formal ruling from the bench. Immediately afterward, Bell would file charges against Carolyn Runyon, Paul McGloin, and Diana Hackel for a range of felonies including perjury, kidnapping, conspiracy to commit murder, murder, and abuse of a corpse. Bell had a lot of sorting out to do.

  In the meantime, the forms required for Dillard’s release from
the Raythune County Jail would be drawn up, reviewed, signed by all the relevant parties. Paperwork, and more paperwork. As a child, Bell had heard the same story every child hears, the assertion that after a nuclear holocaust, only cockroaches will be left on the earth. As an adult, she disagreed. It would be cockroaches—and paperwork.

  She headed for Royce Dillard’s cell. She knew he’d be anxious until he was actually released—who wouldn’t be?—and she wanted to help him keep calm today. Serena Crumpler was already busy with a new case, another one involving a client who couldn’t pay and an outcome that seemed hopeless from the start. Perfect for Serena.

  She found Dillard sitting on his bed, palms on his kneecaps, legs jiggling nervously.

  “I’m pretty keyed up,” he said.

  “Don’t blame you. It’s a big day.” She stood next to the bars that defined this space. She didn’t move any closer to him. By now she knew that if you cared about the man, you kept your distance. He wanted it that way. “I happen to know that Rhonda Lovejoy took the liberty of restocking your dog chow out at the cabin. You should be set for a good long while. No need to rush off to the store right away.”

  He blinked, a bit startled. “You mean I get my dogs back?”

  “Of course you get your dogs back.”

  “Huh. Well, I just figured that once folks got a taste of those dogs of mine—they’re great dogs, Mrs. Elkins, ain’t no denying it—they’d do all they could do to keep ’em. Like when you find a ten-dollar bill on the sidewalk. No hurry in giving it back. You take your time. And unless they make you, you don’t give it back at all.”

  “You run into any trouble about the return of your dogs,” Bell said, “you tell me about it, okay?”

  “Okay.” His legs jiggled a little faster. “Goldie, too?”

  She waited a few seconds before nodding.

  “Yes,” she said. “Goldie, too.” Truth was, as she’d grown closer to Goldie, Bell had conveniently set to one side of her mind the possibility that Dillard might be coming back to claim her. The dog had become a part of her daily routine. She remembered the great consolation of Goldie’s presence on the morning she learned that Nick Fogelsong had been shot, a consolation that was not a matter of words but of spirit—and of warm, supple fur. Conversation was superfluous at such a time. And that’s why a dog was the perfect companion for a crisis: No words. No clichés. No platitudes. No earnest, supportive speeches that, sincere or not, tended to leave Bell feeling even emptier, even more crushingly alone.

  But Goldie belonged to someone else. Bell had known that from the beginning.

  For a moment she didn’t trust herself to speak. She feared her voice might break, revealing just how devastated she was by the idea that Goldie would be leaving.

  “You can come see her whenever you like,” Dillard said. Bell knew how hard it was for him to make the offer. He didn’t want human company. Not ever. But he was deeply obliged to her—as much for taking good care of his dog as for finding the truth and saving him from a prison sentence.

  “Don’t even have to ask,” he said. “Just show up when you please. But listen—if you bring her a treat, make sure you pack a little something for the other dogs, too, okay? Don’t want them to feel slighted.”

  “Sure will.”

  “Anyway,” he said, “at least they’ll be able to stretch their legs all they want pretty soon. Finally gonna turn that patch of land of mine into a dog park. Got word through Serena that the company’s backing off, so they’ll leave me alone. Whole danged project’s shutting down. Not a surprise—not with that Runyon lady out of the picture.” Wonder in his voice, he added, “A lot of folks stand to lose a lot of money out there. Millions, I hear tell.”

  Bell nodded. She was thinking about money and power and possessions, about the things that, for most people, were the supreme motivating forces in life. Dillard was different. He wanted only to be left alone. There was a brand on him, an indelible imprint; he was marked forever by one cold and horrifying morning in his childhood, and he dealt with it by living the way he did. The way he had to. It wasn’t a choice.

  She rubbed a thumb along the painted steel of the bar, part of the row of identical bars that had kept Dillard separated from the world—his world, a world of dogs and mountain air—during his trial.

  “There’s something I still don’t understand,” she said. “Why didn’t you fight back? You were innocent. But you barely even tried. From the very first, it’s like you were just accepting things as they came. Giving up. It was hard to even get you to let Serena defend you. Why? You were desperate to see your dogs. And you knew you didn’t kill him.”

  “But I knew I wanted to. Same thing, ain’t it?” He shifted his position on the cot. “And to tell you the truth, if those folks hadn’t beaten me to it—I’m pretty damned sure I would’ve done it, too, just as sure as I’m sitting here. I hated him that much.” Dillard made a fist as he spoke, and now he raised it and looked at it, peering intently at the sharp knuckles and the crooked thumb that locked the fingers in place.

  “I get that,” Bell said quietly. She knew about anger, anger that hardens into rage. “Hackel’s threat was ugly and vicious. Paying Vera to say your father was a coward—not a hero. Turning your life story upside down. I know how that must have—”

  “No.” At the same moment he interrupted her, Dillard opened his fist. Now he stared into the flat exposed palm. “No, that’s not it.”

  “Pardon?”

  “It wasn’t the fact that Hackel was lying about my father. It was the fact that he was telling the truth.”

  Bell wished he would look up at her. She was confused, and if she could see his eyes, she thought things might somehow become a little clearer. But Dillard wouldn’t do it. He was concentrating fiercely on the lines on his palm.

  “Vera lied from the start,” he murmured. His voice was so low that Bell had to strain to hear him. “She lied when she said my father saved me. Because he didn’t. Vera told Bessie the real story a couple of days after the flood. Bessie pressed her on it. And Vera confessed. Nobody lied to Bessie. Not when she was looking at you with them eyes of hers.” He took a breath. “My father just tried to save his own miserable skin. Didn’t do a damned thing for my mother and me. He got himself out of the house first thing—without a single look back at his wife or his child. After that Mama grabbed me and held me and we got out the window, and when she was lost, somehow I got up on that ridge. Maybe a stranger did it and nobody got his name. All I know is that it wasn’t my father.”

  “But why did Vera lie, all those years ago?”

  “Made a dandy story, didn’t it? Lots of drama—a daddy saves his little boy instead of saving himself. People ate it right up.” He shrugged. “Vera got her name in the paper. She was the center of attention and it felt damned good to her. That’s what Bessie said. And once Vera lied, once she’d told the tale, the other folks up on that ridge didn’t want to go against her. And maybe they weren’t sure what they’d really seen, anyway. I mean, it was a terrible day. And such a wonderful story—the kind of story people needed to hear right then, you know? So that things might seem a little less sad for a while.”

  Vera, Bell thought, had been ready to take Hackel’s money for lying—when she’d really be telling the truth, at long last.

  Her hand still held the bar, tighter than she meant to. She loosened her grip.

  “How long have you known?”

  “Bessie told me when I was ten years old. When she thought I was old enough to handle it. She’d never liked my father. Hated him, matter of fact. That’s why she moved away from Lundale. That’s why she wasn’t living there when the flood came. Said she couldn’t stand to see my mother with him. Said my mother was way too good for that whiskey-soaked SOB—that’s what she called him, every time—but she wouldn’t go. ‘He’s the father of my baby boy,’ my mother always said, when Bessie begged her to leave.”

  “So you just repeated what everybody wanted to h
ear,” Bell said. “You never told the truth.”

  “The truth? The truth would’ve made my mother look like a fool. A fool for marrying that bastard—and a coward for staying with him. Bessie felt the same way. If we’d said what really happened, we’d dishonor my mother’s memory.” His voice had turned raspy, roughed-up. He was holding back a giant wave of emotion, emotion that pushed and surged and threatened to break through the walls he had built inside himself.

  “Listen, Royce,” Bell said. “Your parents were so young when they died. Your father never got the chance to be a different kind of man. You don’t know how he might’ve turned out, if he’d had longer to live.”

  He thought about this. “Well, maybe. All I know is that he didn’t deserve my mother’s love. And he didn’t use up his last breath on this earth to save anybody. Not even himself—the only person he ever cared about. He was a selfish bastard and a failure.”

  “It’s not what you do with your last breath that matters, Royce. It’s what you do with your life.”

  “Yeah. Right.” He snorted his disdain. His words came in an accelerating mess of self-loathing: “And what’ve I done with my life? Not a damned thing. Just can’t ever take hold. Can’t stick. Always running away. Times I tried to reach out to people—or them to me—I just couldn’t do it. Something took over inside me and told me I had to go. Go, go, go. Had to get out of there, fast as I could, so’s I could breathe. That girl Brenda—I cared about her, all those years ago. I did. And I ruined it. She’s married herself now—you met him, it’s Andy Stegner, he’s a good man—so she’s done okay. I don’t see her much, but I guess she’s happy and that’s good. But still. Tears me up something awful—remembering. How I couldn’t stand to be touched. Still can’t. I just can’t deal with—with people, you know? Not a one of ’em. Never. Only time I feel halfway normal is when I’m with my dogs, because they don’t ask me questions, they just like to run and run and—”

  “Royce,” she said. “Your story’s not over yet.”