Since You've Been Gone (9 page)

“I don't need a doctor and I went wading in the pond.”

“
You?
Wading?”

“I guess I was daydreaming.” Rebecca had a believable explanation for what even she didn't understand.

Esther shook her head. “Those pretty linen slacks will never be the same.” She turned to one of her staff members, a young man with huge biceps carrying a three-feet-tall holly tree. “Jake, that's for Mrs. Emerson. Don't put it with the others. She seems to think there's something special about that particular one.” Esther turned back to Rebecca and Douglas. “People and their ideas! It's a wonder to me the world keeps turning. Becky, inside. Douglas, get her some lemonade and aspirin. I'll be there in five minutes. And get the dog some water. His tongue is hanging out.”

Doug insisted Rebecca sit while he gave a wary Sean water and poured lemonade. “Are you sure you're all right?” Rebecca asked as he handed her a tall glass.

“My friend's bratty two-year-old son gave me a worse nip on the ankle last week, and the human mouth has more bacteria than a dog's.”

“Most people don't know that.”

“I like dogs. Like to have one, but Lynn doesn't care for them.”

“Does Lynn care about anything anymore?” Rebecca snapped.

Doug gave her a long look. “Me. Lynn loves me completely.
She
always has even when I didn't deserve anyone's affection.” He paused. “And she loves her brother. Two losers, but she found it in her heart to care about us. That takes someone special, Rebecca, whether you with all your extrasensory powers can see it or not.”

“Does she know anything about the kid?”

Lynn Cochran Hardison looked at her brother. His light brown hair was heavily sprinkled with gray although he was only 31. He hadn't shaved for days, making the deep scar along his jaw stand out even more prominently. The scar was the result of a prison fight that had almost killed him six years ago. Since then he'd grown leaner and more muscular as he'd prepared himself for more battles. It seemed to Lynn that even his eyes had acquired a wolfish look, as if he'd transformed into a predator before his parole.

Even after his year of freedom, he still wore a hunted look. And no wonder, Lynn thought. It seemed the police were looking for any reason to harass him even though he'd never missed a day of work at Maloney's Garage, where he was a mechanic. He had also scrupulously obeyed the law, not even getting a parking ticket. But Larry was surly and neither his boss nor his co-workers liked him. He was also drinking too much. He now poured another shot of Jim Beam and limped back to the stained wing chair he'd bought at a garage sale. His right leg had been permanently damaged when Bill Garrett shot him while Larry was committing a robbery.

“I haven't talked to Rebecca except for when she came in Vinson's last night,” Lynn said. “I'm sure Doug will see her today. He'll find out what she knows.”

“Why would she tell him? She doesn't know about this
great transformation your husband experienced. She thinks he's still a creep like me.”

“Don't take that sneering tone when you talk about Doug,” Lynn flared. “He knew he couldn't go on with the drinking and the heroin, especially after what happened to you. He's worked damned hard to change. He's trying to live a good life, that's all. He's great to me, he's trying to be a good friend to you—he doesn't deserve your ridicule.”

“While he was busy turning himself into a model citizen, I was in the penitentiary,” Larry said bitterly. “Have I ever told you what it was like in there?”

“About a hundred times.”

“I love it when you get sarcastic.” Larry took a slug of bourbon. “You and Doug did everything I did. You just didn't get caught.”

“We didn't commit burglary and pull a gun on a cop. That was your bright idea.”

“But you didn't mind doing the drugs I scored from my ill-gotten gains,” Larry snarled.

Lynn's eyelids dropped over her piercing gray eyes. She stared at her lap for a moment, then sighed. “I'm sorry for everything that's happened to you. And you're right—technically Doug and I were just as guilty as you. We were all crazy back then. But it wasn't because of us you got caught robbing those houses. That was Rebecca.”

“Rebecca who somehow found out what I was doing and set her uncle on me. He
shot
me.”

“You pulled a gun on him, Larry,” Lynn said softly.

“I wasn't going to shoot him. I just freaked. And look what happened to me. I'm a damned wreck. My leg hurts all the time, I can't afford anything …”

“Why
can't
you afford anything? You make a decent salary, certainly enough to pay for this apartment and your living expenses. You even bought a stereo.” Lynn looked around. “At least I thought you did. Where is it?”

“I didn't like it. I got rid of it.”

“You loved it.” Larry drained his glass and looked sullenly
out the window. “You
had
to sell it, didn't you? What are you into?”

“Nothing. I'm not in debt, but I know you'll draw your own conclusions, negative as always.” He glared at his sister. He was only three years older than she, but he looked at least ten years her senior, with deep furrows in his forehead and lines of petulance and discontent etched around his eyes and mouth. “I'm doin' okay, but not like that Ryan bitch. Why does she get to ruin my life then go on like nothing happened? Now she's written a book so she'll make even more money. She better not have talked about me in her trash.”

“She didn't.”

“You read her damned book?”

“Doug bought it. I wasn't going to read it, but I couldn't resist even though I told her in the store I'd never look at it. Anyway, it doesn't seem to be based on anything about her life in Sinclair. Not even Jonnie.”

Larry's head shot up when she mentioned Jonnie. “Does she know what happened to him?”

“What do you mean?”

“His
murder
. Does she know who killed him?”

Lynn lifted her hands. “How should I know? I think if she had any idea, she would go running to her Uncle Bill and someone would be in a world of hurt. That family thought the sun rose and set on Jonnie.”

“He was a little shithead. Arrogant little twerp. Like brother, like sister.”

Lynn stared while her brother poured another drink. “Rebecca used to be my friend,” she said. “Becky, Molly, and me.”

“If you say you were the Three Musketeers, I'll vomit.”

“If you don't lay off the bourbon, you'll vomit.”

“And you always exaggerate how good a friend you were to Rebecca and Molly.
You
weren't a Ryan. As for the bourbon, it improves my mood. Might improve yours, too, as well as your memory. Want one?”

“No. I don't drink anymore.” Lynn stood and walked
toward her brother. She was tall, slim-hipped and full-busted. She had developed early and been sought after by males of various ages since she was 14, but she'd always been faithful to her childhood love, Douglas Hardison. They used to look striking together. Now they looked rather odd, Lynn with her lean platinum hardness, Doug with his darkly round physique. But as Lynn's husband grew rounder, eating compulsively from some nervous discontent he refused to discuss, her brother grew thinner and more taut from relentless workouts to make up for his impaired leg. But their love had only deepened with the years. “Why are you so upset about Becky Ryan?” Lynn asked Larry.

“After what she did to me you have to ask? I hate her.”

“She was young when she blurted out to Bill Garrett about you being the one robbing houses. I hate her for it, too, but it was a long time ago. You act like it happened yesterday. And you act like you hate her more now than you did then.”

“She's back because of that kid.”

“Todd? What's that got to do with us?”

“She sees all, she knows all.”

“She didn't see or know a thing when Jonnie disappeared. She probably won't have any more success with Todd Ryan.” Lynn's eyes narrowed. “But what would you care if she did know something about Todd? What's your problem, Larry?”

Larry tossed back the bourbon, grimaced, then hurled his glass against the wall.

SUNDAY, 11:OO A.M.

Deputy G. C. Curry entered Bill Garrett's office slowly. He felt embarrassed about the information he'd come to deliver.

“Got a few minutes, Chief?” he asked.

Bill looked at him with tired blue eyes. “Sure. What's up?”

“You told us Todd Ryan might be in a deserted building.” Garrett's niece had given him this brilliant heads-up. Curry had great admiration for Garrett except for his one weakness—his belief in this flaky woman who claimed to have ESP. Yes, Curry had heard the tales from older deputies of her successful leads in the past, but it was his opinion the kid had merely said something that got Garrett's mind working in the right direction and for some unfathomable reason, he'd given the girl credit. Whatever. If he didn't report what he'd just heard and it got back to Garrett some other way, Garrett would be furious with him. “We've checked every deserted building within a two-mile radius and come up with nothing.”

“Damn.”

“We might do better tomorrow.”

“Damn,” Bill repeated. “Sorry. I know everyone's doing their best. I appreciate it.”

“I have a five-year-old boy,” Curry said. “If someone snatched him… well, let's just say I couldn't live with myself if I didn't push to the limit to find this child. Anyway, I've got a piece of information, but I don't know how reliable it is. Not very, I'd say, considering the source, but you said you wanted to know
everything—
”

“Just tell me, Curry.”

“Well, you know old Skeeter Dobbs.”

Bill nodded. Everyone in town knew Skeeter Dobbs. His family had once been near-royalty in Sinclair, owners of the Dobbs Saltworks just outside of town and the opulent Dobbs Hotel on Main Street. Skeeter's grandfather Carson lost everything in the Wall Street crash of 1929 and jumped from the Presidential Suite on the sixth floor of his hotel. Skeeter had not been born until the early forties, but his father never tired of recounting the family's history. Unfortunately, the highlight for him was describing in grisly detail Carson's suicide: While his young son stood wailing on the sidewalk, Carson had sat in a window for a few minutes, contemplating his options, before hurling himself forward, barely missing the child with what would have been the fatal impact of his body. Carson's skull had burst against the concrete, spraying brains and gore. It had been nearly ten minutes before shocked bystanders could calm and drag away his screaming, blood-splattered son.

Years later this son had been graced by the birth of a child with below normal intelligence and several other mental problems that had remained untreated. However, the boy did have a vivid imagination, making him a perfect audience for his father's lurid recounting of his own father's suicide. Finally the child came to believe witnessing the suicide had been his own horror and, along with his other inadequacies, it had twisted and confused him. Now Carson Randolph Dobbs III was known as Skeeter, had never held the most menial job more than a few months, kept himself soused in wine, and constantly watched the top floor of what had been the Dobbs Hotel, convinced the building still belonged to him and that the Presidential Suite was haunted by his grandfather.

“What about Skeeter?” Bill asked.

“He's here. Been in and out of here all day but wouldn't say until a few minutes ago what his business was. Seems he's got a story. I listened, tried to humor him, but he insists on talking to you.”

“What does he want to talk about?”

“Klein's Furniture Store, what else?”

“The old Dobbs Hotel, you mean. Has he seen the ghost again?”

“Oh sure. Old Carson Dobbs must be the busiest damned ghost in the world.”

Bill grinned slightly. Curry was right—according to Skeeter, Carson was one active spirit.

“But Skeeter swears this time things were different at the hotel. He says last night Carson was acting strange and was in the deserted attic.” Curry shrugged. “I know he's nuts, but the deserted' detail got my attention. Besides, he's planted out front again and this time he says he's not moving until morning unless he finally gets to talk to you.”

“I can spare him a few minutes since we're getting absolutely nowhere. I'm just sitting here taking up space. Send in Skeeter.”

In a few moments Skeeter shuffled in. One shoe bore a loose sole that flapped when he walked, exposing a sock that might once have been white. He wore khaki pants, clearly a handout because they were too big, rolled twice at the ankles and held up by a lady's tattered pink belt. His thin, faded shirt was covered by a circa 1920s wool suit jacket that was much too short for the skeletal Skeeter. The hem rode a few inches above his waist and his sleeves were almost three-quarter length. Bill believed the jacket must have belonged to his grandfather because Skeeter had owned it since he was a young man. Once Bill had forced him to remove it after a couple of punks had roughed him up, and he'd seen a Saville Row label sewn in the back. Skeeter wore it throughout the summer, even when the temperature hit the nineties and the humidity was unbearable.

“How do, Chief Garrett,” Skeeter said. “Did Deputy Curry tell you what I seen?”

“A little. Want some coffee, Skeeter?”

Skeeter appeared to consider this. “Well, don't mind if Ido.”

“And we've got some nice fresh pastry here. How about a doughnut or a Danish?”

The man was rail thin, his cheekbones sticking out cadaverously
under his grayish skin. He thought some more, a formality since Bill knew he was starving. “I'll have a Danish. I like foreign food.”