Judas Burning

by Carolyn Haines

  Camille. She had no idea of the repercussions. She’d hidden the dead girl’s bracelet where he couldn’t find it, and a shard of her pottery told him she’d been at the scene where the body had been discovered.

  He put the ammunition in the bottom of the boat along with the high-powered rifle and covered them with an old tarp. His plan was to wrap the Mexican’s body with weights. That would hold Chavez underwater for so long that even if he did eventually float, there wouldn’t be much of him left. First, though, he had to get Chavez.

  He’d just finished stowing the gear when he heard Camille calling him. She was wearing the fedora she’d taken a shine to. Her hair was tucked up inside it, and her knees showed through her old jeans. He smiled. Not even those clothes could detract from her loveliness.

  “I’m going into town for a while,” she said. “I need some more glaze for the clay.”

  “Be careful.”

  “I’ll probably eat lunch at the Hickory Pit. Do you want me to bring something back?”

  “Fried chicken, fried okra, English pea salad, yams, and cornbread.” He didn’t really want the food, but it was one more assurance that Camille intended to come back to him. He sometimes wondered if, one day, she simply wouldn’t return. She was a talented artist, and Vivian and Calvin were always holding that out to her, offering her opportunities he could never give her. He accepted that one day she might choose the world her parents offered. And then they would destroy her.

  “You look sad,” she said, walking up to him and touching his lips with her finger. “You don’t sleep well anymore, Eustace. What’s wrong?”

  He felt the weight of his worries crushing him. “I’m fine. My leg hurts sometimes.”

  “That doctor did a piss-poor job of fixing you. If you would go to Mobile, one of the orthopedists there might be able to make it better. At least fix it where it didn’t hurt all the time.”

  “I’ll think about it.” She was so tender. When she’d first come to the camp, she cried when he killed the fish. She still ate little meat, and she avoided the skinning shed when he was working there.

  “Eustace, you don’t like me to say this, but I have money. I could pay for the doctor. You don’t have insurance, but we could cover it.”

  He hated it when he felt less than able to provide in her eyes. He turned away abruptly. “I said I’ll think about it.”

  Her hand grazed along his shoulder and down his arm. “Okay. I’ll be going then.”

  He turned back to watch her walk away, and cold fear gripped him. He’d spoken harshly to her, something she couldn’t take. She hadn’t reacted, though. She’d simply walked off. Did it mean she wasn’t coming back? He stopped himself from going after her. He had to hold on to the fact that he loved Camille. Whatever was best for her was what he wanted. If she chose to leave, he would not lift a finger to stop her. That was the one thing he could offer her that no one else ever had—a choice.

  As soon as her car had disappeared from sight he got in the boat. He’d been searching for Chavez for the past three days and had seen no sign of him. Eustace expected the woods to erupt any day with national guard, state troopers, and volunteers. He had to find Chavez, and he had to find him fast. He headed upriver, away from the mournful baying of the hound.

  J.D. hadn’t stopped by lately, either. That wasn’t a good sign. J.D. was smart, and he would eventually put it all together. It was Eustace’s job to see that whatever facts J.D. had gathered, none of them pointed to Camille.

  Eustace had tracked Chavez to Dupree’s Hideout, where the outlaw Pascal Dupree was supposed to have buried a treasure. The land was more marsh than solid ground, and a careless man could find himself sinking beneath the fetid muck. Eustace hoped to help Chavez become fatally careless.

  He opened the throttle of the boat, kicking up a large wake, and let the boat fly. An hour later, he turned into the right bank of the Leaf River. A small creek emptied into the river, and he navigated beneath the high banks and into the interior. When he’d traveled as far as he could, he cut the motor. Drifting to a tree, he tied off the boat and got out, his rifle in his hand, listening to the chatter of blue jays.

  The ground felt firm, but he knew to use caution. Little sunlight penetrated the thick canopy, and the ground was damp with rotting leaves and humidity. Mosquitoes droned around his head, but he ignored them. More dangerous were the snakes. A thick brown body eased off the bank and into the water, spiraling away. Moccasins gave no warning, unlike rattlesnakes, and their bite was just as deadly.

  Pushing tree limbs out of his way, Eustace began the trek into the swamps. Half a mile in, he came upon a maze of fresh springs, hillocks, and cypress trees. The Mexican had hidden the boat, and Eustace hadn’t tracked it down yet. He’d hoped to find it in the small canal, but it wasn’t there.

  A limb snapped. Eustace swung toward the sound, aiming the rifle as he turned. Chavez was a dim shape among the trees. Eustace didn’t bother to sight. He didn’t have time. He pulled the trigger and saw the man flinch and go down to one knee when the deer slug hit him. Then he was up and running, too fast for Eustace to give chase.

  Eustace sat down on a cypress knee. He was trembling, and he had to catch his breath. He’d hit the man; he knew that much. He’d wounded him. Now Chavez was running through the woods, bleeding. Eustace heard the splash of water, the crackle of dead limbs underfoot. The man was moving fast. He was getting away.

  A good hunter would follow the blood trail and bring an end to his quarry’s misery. In his younger days, Eustace would have done exactly that. He’d followed his share of deer and cut their throats to end their suffering.

  He closed his eyes. The deer slug should have brought the man down. Even a hit in the shoulder ought to have felled him. But it hadn’t. Chavez had been little more than a shadow, half real and half imagined. Ghostly. Eustace’s trembling increased. He was starting to see the man as not real, not human. As something more.

  It was his responsibility to go after him. He couldn’t have gotten far. Using his rifle as a crutch for his bad leg, he stood and listened. The swamp was silent. Not even a bird fluttered through the trees. He moved to where Chavez had been when he was shot. He found no trace of the man. In the trunk of an old sweet gum he found his bullet. If he’d hit him, the bullet had gone clean through. If he’d hit him. The man had fallen to his knees. Eustace searched the ground and found no evidence either way.

  He made his way back to the river. For the first time in his life he didn’t notice anything on the river as he sped toward home.

  J.D. watched the sweat darken the back of Dixon’s shirt as she moved through the thick underbrush, retracing her steps in an effort to find the spot where she’d picked up the sales slip.

  “Damn it all to hell. Everywhere looks like everywhere else,” she said.

  The day was murderously hot, the humidity as high as it could get without liquefying the air. They’d been at it for two hours, and Dixon was determined to find the place. He had to give her that; she was tenacious.

  “Right in here,” she said, sweeping her hand around an area. “It had to be right in here.”

  J.D. looked at the ground. He’d had to look, just on the off chance there was a print or some other physical evidence. In all likelihood, the wind had carried the sales slip into the woods until it had hung on the underbrush.

  “Thanks, Dixon,” he said.

  “It didn’t help, did it?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know what will help now.” He felt as if Angie Salter stood just out of sight, waiting for him to find her, to save her. It was an oppressive feeling.

  “Chavez has to be here, in these swamps,” Dixon said. She pushed her hair off her hot forehead. “He has to be here.”

  J.D. agreed. Francisco Chavez could not have left the area. He’d had men checking every vehicle that came and went from Fitler. Every boat. Chavez had to be there, but no one had seen him. The man had to eat, and without a gun or fishing gea
r, he couldn’t sustain himself.

  Unless someone was helping him.

  The thought came unbidden and fully developed. He pulled out his cell phone and dialed the sheriff’s office. When Waymon answered, he asked, “Camille Holbert. Have the roadblocks been checking her car?”

  The pause told him. He wanted to curse but didn’t.

  “Waymon, find out when she’s come and gone. Don’t upset the volunteers, but get the times and get them exact. I’ll find out where she went.”

  “They were afraid of Calvin,” Waymon admitted. “They were afraid if they stopped her and she complained, Mr. Holbert would call up the loans they owe.”

  J.D. leaned against a tree and closed his eyes. He felt sick. Angie Salter was probably dead and buried in the woods and would never be found. The man responsible had very likely hitched a ride in the roomy trunk of a Mercedes with a crazy woman who didn’t realize what she was doing.

  “Just find out what you can.” He hung up and began his descent down the river bank.

  “What’s wrong?” Dixon asked.

  “There’s a chance he caught a ride out of here.” Eustace’s camp was blocked from view by the trees, but J.D. knew exactly where it was.

  For most of J.D.’s life, he had turned to Eustace in times of need. But not now. If Camille had helped Chavez escape, she was an accessory to kidnapping and murder. It would prove what Calvin and Vivian had been saying—that Camille was incapable of making sane decisions. He didn’t have to look far down that road to see what would happen. Vivian would have her institutionalized. Anything to get her away from Eustace.

  “Who would give him a ride?” Dixon asked, sliding down the steep bank beside him.

  He didn’t answer.

  She stopped. “Camille Holbert?”

  The way she said it, he could tell she didn’t want to believe it.

  “It’s a possibility. Just that, a possibility,” he said.

  He started down the river to the west toward a trail that would take them back up the bank and to his SUV. He’d wanted Dixon’s company. He’d wanted her not to be with Medino. Now, he needed to get rid of her before he confronted Camille and Eustace.

  “Why would Camille do such a thing?” Dixon asked.

  He thought about his answer. “She’s tender-hearted. She might have thought Chavez was in a bad way and had no one else to turn to.”

  Dixon kept pace with him. “I don’t think she did it.”

  He turned to look at her. “You don’t?”

  She shook her head. “Your friend watches her like a hawk. I doubt he leaves the camp if she’s there alone. He would have known, wouldn’t he?”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  They made their way to the Explorer. J.D. turned the air conditioner on high. The SUV lumbered across the bridge, dodging potholes. J.D. stopped and looked out the window at the river. It was only against the bridge abutments that he could tell how swift the current really was. Was Angie Salter beneath the water? He didn’t believe so. She hadn’t drowned. Dead or alive, someone had her.

  He chanced a glance at Dixon. She rode with her eyes closed, the air blowing so hard on her face that it lifted her hair off her forehead. Her eyelashes were dark against her cheeks, which showed the faintest trace of freckles.

  “Why are you staring at me?” She opened her eyes.

  “You’re a beautiful woman.”

  He liked that she didn’t deny it.

  She looked past him to the river. “Will they really replace this bridge?”

  He shrugged. “Probably. In ten or twenty years.”

  “Good. I like it this way. If the bridge were easy to cross, folks would start building across the river.”

  He knew what she meant, and he was unreasonably pleased. “One of the reasons I came home to Chickasaw County was because of the woods and the isolation. I spent some time working in the Atlanta police department. Too many people. Too many cars.” He laughed. “Just too much of everything. I wanted to be somewhere with lots of trees and dirt roads and country people.”

  She faced him as he drove slowly off the bridge. “I came here because I had to prove something to myself. And I was becoming an alcoholic.”

  He didn’t protest. “How’s it coming?” he asked.

  “Better than I thought in some ways, not so good in others.”

  He turned down the drive to Eustace’s camp. The Mercedes wasn’t there. “You sure put a kink in Big Jim’s tail.”

  “He needs to have it snatched out.”

  J.D. laughed. “I couldn’t agree with you more.”

  “You do?”

  “He’s a pompous ass who runs the county with an iron fist. As long as he has Calvin Holbert at his side, he has power. Calvin controls the bank, which controls the loans. And right now Big Jim controls Calvin. It’s an ugly combination.”

  “Thanks for telling me that.”

  “As if you didn’t know.” He smiled at her as he parked the Explorer. “You’re smart, Dixon Sinclair. I’m going to treat you like I understand that.”

  “You’re not the average lawman,” she said.

  “God, I hope not.” He got out and went around to open her door.

  She stepped into the shade of a big oak and looked around. “I don’t think they’re home.”

  “Eustace keeps beer cold in the minnow vats. We could pop a top and take a dip in the artesian water. I need to wait until he or Camille comes back, and we might as well make ourselves comfortable.”

  He could see the idea appealed to her.

  “I didn’t bring a swim suit,” she said.

  “Good. Neither did I,” he said. “We can swim in our clothes.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Tormented, Eustace kicked the throttle of the boat wide open as he drew close to home. Finding Angie Salter wouldn’t conclude the investigation. J.D. was like a snapping turtle that had caught hold of a hand. He’d hang on until he gnawed through the flesh, or until someone bashed him in the head. He would not stop until Chavez and Angie had been found. Killing Chavez—if indeed he had—had only delayed the inevitable.

  Once he got back home, he’d talk to Camille. For the last few days, he’d felt as if she were slipping away from him. He would take her somewhere. Whatever she’d done, he wouldn’t let anyone hurt her. He’d take her some place where he could watch over her.

  He didn’t know what Camille’s involvement with Chavez was. Camille was tender. She wasn’t cruel. But she drew a line between creatures and humans, and her compassion often didn’t extend to her fellow man. She sometimes seemed trapped between dreams and reality. In a dream state she could do almost anything, especially if she were being led by someone she viewed as a spiritual leader, a man who communed with the natural world.

  It wasn’t right for her to hurt someone. Eustace understood that. He could never allow her to do it again. And he would watch her. He would be vigilant. It would be okay.

  He tried to convince himself that, somehow, he could make it all work out right as he sped toward home. Nearing the camp, he slowed the boat and listened. Silence. He coasted into the landing and saw the sheriff sitting at a picnic table. The reporter was in the minnow vat, her hair slicked back with water. Eustace swore. He needed time to convince Camille to let him lead her.

  Eustace tied the boat and walked up the steep bank to J.D. The reporter jumped to the side of the vat and pulled herself out, water sluicing off her. He noted that she was wearing her clothes, and he couldn’t help but think that J.D. was slipping. Four empty beer bottles sat on the table.

  “What brings you here?” Eustace asked. It wasn’t a friendly greeting.

  “I came to ask a question.” J.D. squinted against the sun.

  “I remember the days when you’d come here to visit, not to ask questions.”

  J.D. slowly stood up. “And I remember when I used to feel welcome.”

  “Ask what you came to ask.” Eustace felt the sun on his back. His feet w
ere slightly apart. He’d deliberately left the rifle in the boat, but now he wished for it. The reporter, still by the vat, wrung out her shirt. She was watching the scene unfold.

  “Is it possible Camille took Chavez out of here?”

  Eustace considered it, trying not to show the terror that momentarily overtook him. Camille had not helped Chavez escape, but if J.D. could not produce the man, then Camille might get the blame for that. He decided on a simple answer. “No.”

  “Look, Eustace, I know Camille’s had so many labels applied to her that she might not give credence to what folks are saying about Chavez. If she helped him, it would be without full knowledge. If he’s gone from here, I need to know it.”

  Eustace’s voice rose. “She hasn’t done anything. Why would she? Why would she help a stranger?” His heart was thumping. He tried unsuccessfully to calm himself.

  “Where is Camille?” J.D. asked.

  “She’s gone in to town. She sees her folks a good bit. I don’t know why they want to act like I keep her prisoner down here. She’s free to go anywhere, anytime.”

  “Eustace, there’s a girl missing who could still be alive. God knows what she might have been through, but if she’s alive, we have to find her.”

  “Angie Salter isn’t alive.”

  “You know this?”

  “I haven’t seen the body, but she’s dead. I’d be willing to bet she died when the other one did.”

  J. D. exploded. “I’m not willing to bet one way or the other. This is a girl’s life we’re talking about.”

  “No, it isn’t. She’s dead, J.D., and you might as well give up the hope that you’re gonna find her alive. She’s dead and you won’t ever find that Mexican.”

  “How are you so certain she’s dead?”

  It wasn’t a question but an accusation. Eustace had to divert J.D.’s suspicions away from Camille. It would be better if J.D. suspected him.

  “I lied to you about the girls. I saw them the day they disappeared. The Salter girl was just a slut. She was carrying on with her tits uncovered. Whatever happened to her, she brought it on herself.”