A Killing in the Hills

by Julia Keller

  ‘Oh, just driving around.’ Chill kept his hands on the wheel, where the guy could see them. He knew that was important.

  ‘Just driving around.’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘Well, you were swerving a little bit back there. But you don’t look or sound like you’ve been drinking.’

  ‘No, sir. I leave that to my girlfriend.’ Chill used a head-tilt to indicate the backseat. It was better, he figured, to mention her first, before the officer saw her. Make it clear he had nothing to hide. ‘Got herself shit-faced tonight. Again. Out with her girlfriends. They called and asked me, could I come pick her up? Before she did some real damage to herself.’

  Teddy leaned to his right. Squinted at the window. He saw a lump. Heard a moan.

  ‘She don’t look so good.’

  ‘Well, officer,’ Chill said, ‘she don’t smell so good, neither.’

  They both laughed.

  ‘Been there,’ Teddy said.

  Chill waited. He felt sweat crawling down his neck. Felt like ants.

  His fingers twitched. Gun could be in his hand real quick. He thought about the cop’s head, about how it would look when it blew up, the blood and bone and brain, and he thought about how it would all happen so fast that the cop’s face wouldn’t even get a chance to look surprised. Wouldn’t be time for that.

  Chill could play it either way.

  He could shoot or not shoot. He didn’t really care.

  A second passed.

  Another.

  Officer Wolford smiled. Stood up straight again, after bending over to look in the back window. Two taps on the roof of the car. That was a habit with Teddy Wolford, his way of saying good-bye. Just like the guys in the pit did it, when they’d finished their work and were sending the car back out onto the track, tank topped off, lug nuts tightened.

  Tap tap. Take care. Good luck.

  ‘Okay, buddy,’ he said. ‘You get that gal of yours to a safe place, soon as you can. And watch yourself on the road. You hear me? Don’t want no accidents.’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘You have a good night.’

  ‘You, too.’

  And so because Teddy Wolford was new, because he was tired and bored, because he didn’t follow protocol and challenge the sweaty man in the compact car – because of all those things, and other things, too, unknown and unknowable things – Danielle Marie would end up having herself a daddy, a daddy she knew, a daddy who played with her and took care of her, surprising himself again and again over the years with how much he loved her, surprising everybody. She had a daddy, instead of what might have happened. Instead of her having to grow up with just the stories, just pictures of a man in a deputy’s uniform who’d been murdered on a mountain road on a cold November night when she was barely two months old.

  Chill passed the peppy little sign on the right-hand side of the road, the white one with green letters and green piping around the edges, that said WELCOME TO ACKER’S GAP. GLAD YOU STOPPED BY. HOPE YOU CAN STAY AWHILE.

  He passed the post office. The storefront public library. A payday loan place.

  The street seemed empty, hollowed out, as if some lumbering piece of heavy equipment had come along earlier that day and pushed everything except the buildings into a big pile and then bumped over the pile, smashing it down. The reason it looked that way, Chill knew, was the cold. It was just too damned cold for most people to be walking around after dark tonight.

  He slowed down even more. He saw a man hurrying to a Dodge pickup parked in a No Parking zone, crossing the street in front of Chill’s vehicle, shoulder-length hair swinging every which way in the wind, preoccupied, head down, steps quick but careful, one hand holding his coat closed at the throat. The man didn’t even look up. He arrived at his truck, ripped open the door, slid inside. The truck jumped away from the curb and was gone, engine screaming at the effort needed to get going so quickly in this crazy cold.

  A thin layer of frost was smeared across the sidewalks. In the patches where the streetlights reached, the glittering made them look almost magical. Almost like stars, Chill thought; it was as if stars were trapped in the sidewalk. They kind of twinkled.

  You stupid-ass.

  Twinkled. Yeah, right.

  He drove slowly past the courthouse. The downtown was a dead place.

  Past the Walgreens.

  Past a bank, and then a coin laundry.

  Past a thrift store called Second Time Around.

  Past a bar. Its big front window was dark, covered by a thick rumpled drape, but you could tell what it was by the neon Pabst Blue Ribbon sign hanging by two wires.

  Past Cappy’s Shoe Repair and Custom-Fit Orthotics. Past a store that sold comic books and video games. The next couple of storefronts were empty, with FOR LEASE sloppily whitewashed on their big front windows.

  Past the Salty Dawg. Parking lot still blocked off, which pleased him. Yellow tape wound around black barrels, one set in each corner.

  Then he spotted it. The square hulking place just down the block from the Salty Dawg. He remembered it from Saturday, remembered flying past the place when he peeled out, trigger hand still trembling a little bit, still vibrating, body so jazzed up and jangling that there’d been a crazy part of him that thought he maybe didn’t need the car at all, that maybe he could fly like a bird or even make himself invisible.

  He’d been through Acker’s Gap lots of times, he’d noticed this building, but never cared enough to ask what the hell it was. Big windows on all sides. Biggest one in front. Like a big dead eye.

  Perfect.

  Just what he was looking for.

  He picked up his cell.

  His thumb was so greasy with sweat that it kept sliding off the numbers. Finally he got it right.

  911.

  49

  The sheriff’s cell went off. Bell, sitting at the kitchen table, clasping and then reclasping her hands, watched his face as he listened. It seemed to grow grayer by the minute. He didn’t blink.

  ‘Okay,’ Nick said. He was standing by the counter, in front of the green plastic dish drainer. He hadn’t taken off his coat or his hat. ‘Okay. Patch him through. And then you know what to do.’ He slapped a big palm over the tiny mouthpiece. ‘It’s the nine-one-one operator. Says a caller wants to speak directly with me.’ A pause. ‘He says he’s the guy who shot up the Salty Dawg.’ Another pause. ‘He’s got Carla.’

  Bell bolted from her seat. She stood up so quickly that the violence of the motion sent the chair toppling backward. It bounced and clattered against the kitchen floor, sounding like a small avalanche of lids and saucepans. Bell paid no attention to it.

  Just before the call came in, she had poured two big mugs of coffee, one for herself and one for Nick, from the pot she’d hastily made. She’d needed something to do with her hands.

  The sheriff had been on the phone constantly since his arrival here, pacing, working through his checklist: law enforcement officials in neighboring counties, hospitals, Carla’s friends and teachers.

  Working through it again.

  Nothing. No one had seen or heard from her.

  Now Bell was right beside him as he uncupped the mouthpiece. She didn’t have to stand so close, because Nick had switched the call to speakerphone. She knew that, and still didn’t move away.

  ‘Go ahead,’ he said.

  ‘Here you are, Sheriff,’ the operator said.

  A click, a blast of static, and then a man’s voice. Bell had never heard it before, but she knew it well. It sounded like a hundred other voices she’d heard while growing up in Acker’s Gap. A thousand. The familiar lilt and curl and twang. A way of drawing out certain syllables and blunting the ends of others. Prideful, prickly.

  It was a voice from the hills.

  And because she knew this voice, knew it so well, she was more terrified than ever. Now she understood what they were dealing with: a kid. A punk with power – whatever power could be temporarily derived from whatever gun he w
as fondling in his nervous hands.

  He wasn’t wily. Wasn’t a strategist. Didn’t indulge in long-term thinking. He jumped when he was poked. Twitched when he was hit. A creature of pure impulse.

  That made him breathtakingly dangerous.

  ‘Hey there, Sheriff,’ Chill said amiably. ‘Cold ’nuff for ya?’

  ‘Carla Elkins. Where is she?’

  ‘First off, doncha wanna know who I am? Since I pulled off the big shootin’ the other day and all?’

  ‘I don’t give a damn who you are,’ Nick said evenly. ‘I want to know about Carla Elkins.’

  Silence.

  ‘Okay,’ Chill said. ‘Okay, okay.’ He chuckled. ‘Well, yeah, I got her. I’ll give her back, but I want some things first. I’m ready to make a deal.’

  ‘Good for you,’ Nick said. ‘But I need proof that you actually have the girl. And that she’s safe.’

  Another silence.

  The next sound in Bell’s kitchen, fuzzy from its mediation through a cell’s speakerphone, was a voice that made her heart jump.

  ‘M-M-Mom?’

  Carla sounded groggy, confused.

  ‘M – mmm-mom? Are you th-there? I c-c-c-can’t – I – don’t—’

  ‘Carla,’ Bell said. ‘We’re coming, sweetie. Hang on. We’re—’

  She was interrupted by a series of muffled bumps and then a rubbing sound. The man was back on the line again. His hard quick breaths came through the speakerphone with a rasp like a nail scratching a sidewalk.

  ‘That good enough for ya?’ he said. ‘Sure do hope so, cause that’s all you’re gonna get.’

  Bell’s instinct was to scream, to threaten and curse at this man, demanding the return of her daughter. Or to beg, to plead, to be sweet to him, to promise him things, to offer him everything she had. Anything he wanted. Just don’t hurt her. Just don’t hurt my child. Please.

  It took every bit of self-control Bell possessed to keep quiet. She had to let the sheriff run the show. She had to believe in his expertise.

  ‘Okay, so she’s alive,’ Nick said. ‘Keep her that way. Now, what do you want?’

  ‘First thing is, I want you and the bitch to back off.’ For the moment, the man’s voice sounded peeved instead of menacing, like a kid asking for a second cookie. ‘Just let it be, willya? Just mind your own damned business. Quit stirring everything up.’

  ‘Don’t know what you mean.’ The sheriff’s voice was calm. Bell wondered how he could be so calm.

  ‘I mean I want you to quit comin’ after us so hard.’

  ‘Who’s “us”?’ Nick said.

  A snort of laughter. ‘You must think I’m the stupidest asshole in the valley. Well, I ain’t. But I’ll tell you this much, I sure don’t plan to—’

  ‘We want the girl. Now,’ Nick said, cutting him off.

  ‘Maybe we better talk about it. Maybe we ought to discuss it in person.’

  ‘Fine. Where and when?’

  ‘That big-ass brick building on Main. The one with them big windows. Same block as the Salty Dawg. Don’t know what you call it.’

  ‘The RC.’

  ‘Whatever. Be there in fifteen minutes.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘Is that all you want?’

  There was a pause.

  ‘Hell, no, that ain’t all I want.’

  The man, Bell sensed, wasn’t ready to make his real demands yet. He hadn’t thought this through. He was winging it.

  ‘I want a hundred thousand dollars,’ he suddenly said, and he said the number as if he’d plucked it from the air. ‘Yeah. No, wait – make it two. Two hundred thousand dollars. Yeah. And a new car. And a clear way outta there. Plus some guns. And some sandwiches.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘You got that?’

  ‘I got that.’ Nick looked at his watch. Now Bell understood. They were trying to trace the call. The sheriff’s aim was to keep the man on the line as long as possible. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘You better not be shittin’ me,’ the man said. ‘You sure as hell better be takin’ me seriously, fat ass, and writin’ all this down, or you’re gonna be in a world of hurt. You and this girl’s mama. You hear me?’

  Bell could feel the sweat crawling down either side of her torso. Her mouth was so dry that swallowing hurt.

  ‘I hear you,’ the sheriff said. ‘I’m writing it down.’

  ‘Good. Good deal. Okay, well, I gotta go. Bring the money and the car, okay? Gotta tell you, though – I ain’t waitin’ too long. Twenty minutes. Tops. Any funny business – well, lemme just say that you’re gonna wish you never messed with me.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘Okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ the sheriff said. ‘Oh, and I got one more thing to say, too.’ He had sounded reasonable up to that point; he’d sported the voice of a man with whom you could do business.

  Now, though, just before he signed off, Nick’s voice changed. Steel glinted in it. You could only push him so far. ‘You harm a single hair on that little girl’s head,’ he said, ‘and I’ll hunt you down and I’ll personally cut off your balls with a rusty knife and hand ’em back to you in a paper sack, you hear me?’

  50

  ‘Whatever he wants, Nick – you do it. You get it. You get it for him.’ Bell hardly recognized her own voice. It was husky, agitated, roughed-up with panic, the words half-hysterical as they tumbled out of her. ‘Whatever he wants. Anything. I’ll be responsible. Put it on me. I don’t care, Nick. You understand? I don’t care.’

  Trembling, moving too fast, blundering her way toward the kitchen counter, she tried to snatch up the key ring that held the Explorer keys. She miscalculated her grab, knocked the ring on the floor. Picked it up, dropped it again, picked it up again. This time, when she picked it up, she held the key ring in both hands for safekeeping.

  ‘Let’s go,’ she said. ‘Let’s go. Let’s go.’

  Nick stood between her and the door, deliberately blocking her way. He closed one big hand around both of her clasped hands. With his other hand, he used a series of gentle but systematic tugs to extricate the key ring from her ferocious grip. He set it back down on the counter.

  ‘I’ll drive,’ he said. ‘Blazer’s right out front.’

  ‘No, no, no – Nick, I’ve got to get us there, we have to go, I’ve got to—’

  She stopped. Fetched a deep breath. She closed her eyes for just a fraction of a second, and she nodded. He was right. She was in no shape to drive. Her thoughts were coming too fast, too wild, too formless and furious, a dizzy swarm, and there were too many of them: She needed to move. She needed to hold still. She needed to talk. She needed to be very, very quiet. She needed to scream. She needed to cry.

  She needed her little girl.

  I oughta call Sam, Bell thought. He deserves that. It’s not fair that he doesn’t know.

  Something stopped her. Pride, maybe. Stubbornness, too. She’d contact him later, and she’d reap whatever whirlwind of blame and anger he chose to send her way, knowing that she’d probably deserve it, too, every bit of it.

  But right now, no. She’d gotten them into this mess – she’d gone her own way, she hadn’t listened to anybody’s advice, she’d been head-strong and arrogant I know best I know what I’m doing damnit and I’m not backing down – and she would get them out of it, too. Her and Carla. She would find a way.

  Sheriff Fogelsong cut off his engine. He’d brought the Blazer to an abrupt halt at the curb in the block before the RC.

  The night was overcast. Stars stayed hidden, tucked behind the layers of mist and endless distance, and the moon seemed to flit in and out of streaming scarves of clouds.

  Fog dawdled low on the ground. With the stores locked up tight, the only light arrived from the thin stalks of streetlights and from the traffic light at the next corner. That stoplight had switched over to a flashing light, as it always did after 8 P.M.; there wasn’t enough traffic downtown at this hour to justi
fy the constant green-yellow-red-green sequencing. It would change back again at 6 the next morning. For now, though, the flashing yellow light pulsed over the empty intersection like a stern repetitive warning.

  Nick swiveled his big body in the car seat, hands on the wide steering wheel, his gaze sweeping across the cold, quiet streets. He moved his head in brief practiced snaps, right and left, forward and backward. For all he knew, the man who’d called him had an accomplice, a look-out. Someone might be watching them now.

  The sheriff’s radio spat out a crackle of static. Incoming call. It was Wanda Markell, the dispatcher from over in Collier County. A deputy, she said, had reported in. Turns out he’d stopped a guy a half hour ago who might’ve been their suspect.

  And let him go.

  ‘Let him go?’ Nick roared into his radio. ‘He let him go? With all the bulletins out there? Shit.’

  ‘Well,’ Wanda said, a little defensively, ‘he had his radio off. Just for a minute or so.’

  ‘Why’d he have his goddamned radio off?’

  ‘Well,’ she said, this time sheepishly, ‘he needed to relieve hisself. You know how it is.’

  Now Nick squinted through the Blazer’s front windshield at the dark structure that dominated the next block, spreading to both ends of it like something that had just kept on expanding until it hit a curb. There were no streetlights on the block.

  This was the Acker’s Gap Community Resource Center, a strapping rectangle composed of yellow brick, with huge picture windows on three of its sides. It dated back to 1953, to a hot June afternoon when Colby Romer – squeezed into a blue three-piece suit, surrounded by his wife and his four kids and a crowd of townspeople who’d come for the free hot dogs – had cut the ribbon on his new Ford dealership. Against that wide inviting glass, the people of Acker’s Gap had once pressed their noses to gaze longingly at the snappy new sedans in bright primary colors. The dealership went out of business on another hot June day, this one in 1964 – the same day Colby Romer filed for bankruptcy, owing close to half a million dollars in gambling debts. Two weeks later he was found in the family den by his son, Ricky Romer, with a plastic dry-cleaning bag tied around his head and a typewritten note on the TV tray that read REAL SORRY. In subsequent years the big building on Main was, at various times, an evangelical church, a flea market, a suite of medical offices, a rehearsal space for a semiprofessional theater group called the Mountain Stage. There was always talk of tearing it down, but that turned out to be a more expensive proposition than just letting it sit.