by K. Gresham
A breathtaking night, to be sure. Matt smiled. The Lord was cooking up a masterpiece.
Matt crossed the parking lot and headed for the small break in the bushes that marked the sidewalk to his new home. He zipped up his windbreaker against the chilly night and breathed deeply of the fresh, crisp country air—nothing like the smell of fish rot near Miami’s docks where he’d grown up. Then a very different, very familiar scent caught in his nostrils.
Blood.
Fresh, wet, acrid blood that smelled of crime and violence and evil.
He turned toward the smell, knowing there would be a lot of it when he found it. Instinct brought the hair up on the back of his neck. He’d spent too much time as an undercover cop not to know danger.
Matt turned to the left, the direction from which the breeze brought the metallic smell of blood.
Then he heard the moan. The low moan of pain. It didn’t sound human.
Matt squinted in the waning light and followed his nose to a grouping of pampas grass at the edge of the church’s parking lot.
The whimpering was louder now. More heart wrenching. Finally, he saw the dark form huddled into a ball near the wheat-like plumes of grass.
The dog was a large one, the shape and coloring of a German shepherd with the face of a bloodhound. Tight around its neck was a leather leash, and the dog was almost choking with it. “Take it easy, boy,” Matt said softly as the dog raised its head to look at him.
Matt loosened the leash. The dog’s head fairly dropped to the ground with relief. Matt leaned over to pet the animal.
His hand touched sticky, wet fur.
He pushed back the weight of the pampas grass, allowing the parking lot light to shine on the dog. Bile belched up the back of the preacher’s throat.
The dog was drenched in blood.
Chapter Three
Shadow
Bobby Peveto, or Bo as he was known, was a man with a past. He wore black because it suited him to remember his dark beginnings. He wore a ponytail because it appealed to the hippie he had once been. He wore a scar across his nose and cheek because a man in prison chose him to be a boy-toy and Bo begged to differ.
Few knew his real name because that was the way he wanted it. He figured if a person knew your name, they could look you up on the computer or get your name from prison files. His boss knew his name, and that made his paperwork square with the IRS. His parole officer knew his name, and that made him square with the Texas Department of Corrections. Beyond that, his name was on a need-to-know basis, and as far as Bobby Peveto was concerned, no one else needed to know.
So to the rest of the world, Bobby Peveto was simply Bo.
’Cept for Dorothy Jo, of course. Dorothy Jo Devereaux was the mom he’d always wished for. His own had died when he was in the second grade, and even those young memories of her were faded. He’d prefer his last name was Devereaux, anyway.
In Bobby’s opinion, Lawrence Devereaux, Dorothy Jo’s real son, had been a stupid son of a bitch.
Bo took his job at the Fire and Ice House seriously, because that job kept him out of Huntsville where he’d first met Dorothy Jo. She’d come in to visit her son one day. Lawrence had been in solitary for something or other, so she’d asked to visit someone who never got visitors. Bo had hated her at first, liked her after a fashion, loved her more than anything when she’d gone before the Parole Board and said she was a cook at an ice house whose owner had agreed to hire Bobby Peveto if they’d let him out. They balked when they heard it was a bartending job, but they weren’t stupid, either. Besides, the judge was one of Angie’s regulars, and he signed the papers. Bo couldn’t drink what he sold, but for seven years he’d made a living wage, which was more than most ex-cons could say.
Maybe it was Bo’s experience that had his antennae going up when the man in the gray slacks and blue windbreaker walked tentatively into the noisy Saturday night bar mob. He looked uncomfortable as hell, Bo noted. The stranger’s face was tinged pink as if he was standing too close to a fire, but it was his hands, fidgeting at his lapel and exposing the hint of a clerical collar, that told Bo this man was in the wrong place.
“You need somethin’?” Bo pushed away from the bar.
The man’s gaze darted around the crowded room, then at the floor, then up to Bo. “I was looking for . . . Miss . . . Unh . . . Angie.”
Bo’s eyes narrowed. “You got business with her?”
“Business?” The pastor’s voice actually cracked. “No,” he stammered. “No business.”
“Then what do you want her for?” Bo planted both feet firmly on the ground.
“I think I found her dog,” the man blurted out.
Bo relaxed. The stranger might be bringing news about Maeve O’Day. Angie was worried sick about her missing mother. “Angie’s in the kitchen.”
“I . . . the kitchen?”
“Through there.” Bo jabbed his thumb at the swinging doors behind the bar, then went to the customer holding up his glass for another draft.
Matt Hayden blew out a sigh of relief and walked through the swinging doors into the kitchen of the O’Day Fire and Ice House. The first thing that struck him was the utter white of the room. The linoleum, the walls, the appliances, the shelves were all white. The second thing that struck him was the smell of bleach and disinfectant. The small clinic Wilks called a hospital didn’t smell this clean.
“Miss O’Day?” he said into the seemingly empty room.
There was a rustle of noise from behind a door, then a number of loud bumps.
Matt gulped. Surely she wasn’t conducting business in a broom closet, he thought.
What emerged from behind the door, however, was a significantly clothed, rag-holding, bucket-carrying Angie O’Day. Her jeans and T-shirt were dirty white; she wore green rubber gloves on her hands.
She took one look at him and scowled.
Angie O’Day didn’t want to be bothered with a lunatic clergyman on a mission from God. Her mother was missing, and her kitchen was under the constant scrutiny of the local authorities. It didn’t matter that it was a Saturday night and half the town was in her bar to party. Angie O’Day wasn’t in a good mood.
“Kitchen’s off-limits to customers,” she said sharply. She grabbed her bucket and walked to the sink.
“Miss O’Day . . .” Matt Hayden wasn’t sure where to begin his bad news. Contrary to popular belief, the seminary did not always train a minister as to what should be said when—especially when—foul play might be involved.
“State your business, then get out.”
The pastor nodded. “I think I’ve found your dog.”
Angie came instantly alert. “Shadow?”
“I’m sorry, Miss O’Day.” Angie saw the troubled look in his eyes and knew a deeper level of fear than she’d experienced all day.
Matt’s voice was quiet against the noise of the Saturday night crowd. “He’s in the church parking lot. I think you’d better come with me.”
“Is he hurt?” Angie was already pulling off her rubber gloves and heading for the door.
“That’s just it, Miss O’Day. He has blood all over him,” Matt said as he looked her straight in the eye, “but I can’t find a scratch on him.”
***
Sheriff Novak’s blue eyes hinted at the German blood of his mother’s family, while the glint in them came wholly from his father’s Czech side. That was how James W. spent most of his life—torn between the sober side of him that was Wilks and the fun-loving side that was Novak.
None of the Novak was showing now, however, as he crouched over the bloodied dog. Angie O’Day stood over his left shoulder, holding her elbows, her face pale. Pastor Hayden held a dripping garden hose behind them. “Helluva lotta blood, all right,” James W. agreed. He brushed his hand through the dog’s wet fur. “No wound.”
“That’s why I called you.” Matt Hayden nodded. “Something . . . or somebody . . . out there has lost a lot of blood.”
James
W. cleared his throat awkwardly.
“You mean . . . Mamma?” Angie asked, trying to control the shiver in her voice. The two men stared in silence at the animal as it lapped at the Tupperware bowl of water Matt had filled.
“I looked around for another animal—thought maybe this one had gotten in a fight . . .” Matt let the words hang.
Shadow laid his head down on the grass, his sides heaving as he fought for breath.
“Shadow might not be wounded,” the sheriff said, “but he’s plenty sick. He needs to be taken to a vet.”
“Is there a veterinarian in town?” Matt asked.
“Nope,” Angie answered for the sheriff. “Closest one is in Bastrop.”
“I can take him,” Matt offered.
“I don’t need your help,” Angie snapped angrily, then turned on the sheriff. Her voice softened appreciably. “What about Mamma?”
“This puts her disappearin’ into a whole new light,” James W. thought aloud. “It’s after six o’clock,” he continued, looking at his watch. “Dang, it’s gonna be hard doin’ this in the dark.”
“I can maybe get you some reinforcements at church tomorrow, if the search is still on,” said Matt.
“That might be my mother’s blood, and you’re gonna let her stay out in the cold all night?” Angie demanded.
“She’s probably holed up in somebody’s house.” James W. put his arm around her shoulder for reassurance. “You know how many people go into Houston or Austin for the weekends.” He let out a chuckle. “Heck, I’ll go over and see if Ernie knows anything.”
“Ernie Masterson?” Matt asked in surprise.
Trying to lighten the tone, the sheriff smiled. “Ernie’ll be able to tell me who’s out of town. He knows everything about everybody. Found a gamblin’ receipt in Joe Crowder’s car one time. Figured out Crowder wasn’t workin’ in Angus, but playin’ craps in Lake Charles. Pumped gas for Sarah Fullenweider—your secretary’s daughter. He saw a suitcase in the back seat and knew a divorce was in the works. He puts two and two together. It’s uncanny.”
“He’s a horrible man,” Angie said with disgust. “I wouldn’t put it past him to drive Mamma out of town as some kind of joke.”
“Ernie’s harmless,” James W. said, patting her on the shoulder. “And your mamma is probably fine. Even if she is lost, don’t forget what a fighter she is.”
“Then how do you explain what’s happened to Shadow?” Angie felt a fresh spurt of tears behind her eyes, but she fought them back. She knelt down and patted her dog. Shadow looked at her as if pleading with her to do something.
“I’ll lay you odds Shadow got himself a raccoon,” James W. said. “Preacher, those reinforcements might be a good idea. Why don’t you announce that we’ll get together at the Muster Tree after services.”
“The Muster Tree?”
“The big oak in the middle of the square,” Angie explained. “It’s where everybody gathers to go to war or to put together search parties.”
“You mean you’ve had to do this kind of thing before?” Matt asked.
“Did it thirty-five years ago when my pa went missing,” James W. said.
Matt looked up sharply. “Where’d you find him?”
James W. slapped his hat on his head. “Never did.”
***
“What if she’s dead, Dorothy Jo?” Angie O’Day posed the question into the two a.m. silence of the closed Fire and Ice House. Bleach and pine-scented cleaner suffused the darkness. The only light in the room came from the Christmas lights overhead and the blue and red neon of the Pabst Blue Ribbon sign on the bar’s back mirror.
Also visible in that mirror were the tired images of Angie O’Day and Dorothy Jo Devereaux. Instead of the usual iced tea they drank at the end of a long night and wash down, both women sat at the bar, a shot glass of whiskey before each, and a bottle of Jim Beam between them.
“Let’s not borrow trouble, Angie,” Dorothy Jo said. She tapped the pack of generic cigarettes on the bar, then pulled one out with her lips. “She’s a strong woman, Maeve O’Day.”
“Was.” Angie shook her head. “She’s turned fragile these last few months. More confused. Heck, if she’s havin’ one of her spells, she won’t even be able to tell anyone her name, much less where she lives.”
“James W. is out there right now.” Dorothy Jo lit her cigarette with a flick of her lighter. “He’s got both his deputies with him. They’ll find her.”
Angie studied the weathered old woman who sat beside her. Dorothy Jo was the most important person in her life next to her mamma. The stocky cook had come to work the day the doors to the Fire and Ice House opened, and missed few since. She’d taken one day off to see her daughter get married over in Pflugerville ten years back. Another one to put her husband in the ground about the same time Angie took over the reins at the Fire and Ice House. Finally, she’d gone up to Huntsville the day her son had been executed for first degree murder.
Dorothy Jo Devereaux was as much a part of the Fire and Ice House as Angie was, and Angie had lived her whole life in the small apartment above the bar. Maeve had bought the firehouse from the town in a closed bidding before anyone in Wilks knew she was even interested in the place. All hell broke out when Maeve opened a bar right across the river from Miss Olivia’s precious Lutheran Church. The brouhaha was one of the highlights of Maeve’s life.
And the last time Wilks held a closed bidding on any business matter.
The memories of the story brought a smile to Angie’s face, and her thoughts turned hopeful. “If Shadow gets better, he can sniff her out. He’s a good dog.”
“He’s a great dog,” Dorothy Jo reassured her.
Angie smiled. “Thanks again for comin’ in tonight while Bo took him to Bastrop.”
“I’d have whupped you if you hadn’t let me know.”
Angie took the first sip of her drink and felt it burn down her throat. The sensation matched the stinging in eyes that were too raw to cry anymore.
Not that she’d let anyone see her cry.
Besides, it was probably the bleach. She just had the cleanest kitchen in Wilks, Texas, that was all.
“I guess that preacher thinks I’m the worst kind of scum, sendin’ my mamma out with my dog for a walk.”
“Honey, you been doin’ that for four years. Your mamma loves those walks. Nobody in Wilks would let her come to harm.”
“Til today.”
“We don’t know that.”
“Lord, Dorothy Jo, what if that was my mamma’s blood all over Shadow?” The sob escaped from Angie before she could hold it back. She rested her forehead in her hand. “My mamma’s my only kin, Dorothy Jo. I haven’t got anybody else.”
“I know, honey.”
“She’s always been there for me. Lord,” Angie said as she raised her head, “what am I gonna do without her?”
Angie looked into the mirror, her gaze scanning the reflected restaurant. “She bought this place, fixed it up, kept it goin’ so I could have somethin’. So I wouldn’t be left with nothin’ like she was.”
Angie slumped. “I don’t want it, Dorothy Jo. Not without Mamma. I want my mamma.”
Dorothy Jo put her withered hand on Angie’s back and rubbed. With her other hand, she puffed on her cigarette. Dorothy Jo shook her head as Angie’s sobs filled the room. She didn’t know how to deal with her own feelings about the missing Maeve O’Day, much less Angie’s.
“What do you think that preacher man was doin’ in here today?” Dorothy Jo asked finally.
Angie’s head came up with a snap. “I don’t care. Anytime that man wants to pass my place, I’ll appreciate it.”
Dorothy Jo smiled inwardly. The best way to get Angie O’Day out of a funk was to spark her Irish temper. “He’s gonna help recruit people for the search party tomorrow,” Dorothy Jo egged on.
“Tomorrow’s gonna be a day late and a dollar short. If he really cared, he’d be callin’ people tonight to get them to help.”
“Now, honey, even James W. said that it’d be easier to search for her in the daytime.”
“I don’t give a damn about easy. It’s supposed to get down to fifty degrees tonight, and my mother’s out in the cold, maybe wounded. They need to be looking for her right now.” Angie pounded her fist on the bar.
The front door to the Fire and Ice House squeaked open. Bobby Peveto walked in, his dark blue bandanna tied around his forehead Indian-style, his face hard as stone. “I left Shadow at the vet’s. He’s gonna make it.”
“What’s wrong with him?” Angie asked.
“The vet agreed there wasn’t a scratch on him.” Bo came around the bar, filled a glass with ice and squirted himself a Coca Cola from the bar hose.
“Why was he so sick, then?” Angie pressed.
“The vet says we might even be able to get him back in the mornin’. Vet’s got Shadow on an IV, cleanin’ out his system.” Bo took a long drink of his soda.
Angie sat straighter in her chair. It was the first time she’d ever seen Bo evade a direct question.
Seven years ago, when she’d interviewed him at the state pen for his job, she’d been new and he’d been less gray. But both of them had seen enough of life not to waste time on pleasantries. Already knowing about the manslaughter conviction, she’d straight-out asked him for what crime he’d done time.
“I killed a man, Miss O’Day,” he’d said. His back had been straight. His eyes clear.
“What for?” she’d asked.
“Raping my sister. Only blood I had.”
Angie had understood that answer. In Bobby Peveto she’d found a soul mate. If anyone ever laid a hand on her mother, Angie O’Day would do the same thing.
Kill.
She had hired Bobby Peveto, murderer and Texas Department of Corrections parolee, on the spot, pending the judge’s release.
That same man who’d admitted to murder without pause wasn’t answering Angie’s question.
“Bo, what is wrong with my dog?” Angie demanded, her voice hard, hiding the growing fear in her heart.
