“I had to see her for myself.” His voice cuts through mine. “After she was on TV.”
“Don’t. Talk. Whatever your interest, it was suicidal. They are on you. My partner, Rusty, is going to interview you. He is not your friend even though he will tell you he is mine. There will be another cop with him who is also not your friend, but you’ll know that right away. You will think you’ve seen this good guy–bad guy routine on TV a thousand times and won’t fall for it, but it’s so tough when it’s happening to you, Wyatt. They will stick an ice pick in every nerve. Everybody has a breaking point. Everybody. You will want badly to make them understand, and if you go that route, one of them will pretend that he does. Don’t fall for it.”
I suck in another deep breath and expel it noisily. It’s so cold, I’m surprised I can’t see it. “I respectfully ask to see my lawyer before answering any questions. That’s what you’re going to say instead of punching one of them in the mouth. They want you to get primal. They live for suspects like you, with muscle. They even have a name for inciting suspects before they walk in the room. Going for some Sugar. You know who came up with that line? My granddaddy, in honor of Sugar Ray Robinson. He was a fan. He threw some punches in here himself.”
I let my eyes drift to the camera on the ceiling, hesitating. I know its blind spot. How far can I go in pissing Rusty off?
“Move down to the far corner of the bench.” I palm his arm roughly. “I mean it. Move. Hold out your hand.” The last sentence an order.
He unfurls his fingers slowly. We have about two square feet to work with, so my leg is snug against his knee. I press a pen to his palm, first gently, then harder, to overcome the ridges and calluses.
“That’s my husband’s cell number. As you know, a lawyer. A really good one. I called him, and he’s coming, but he’s more than an hour away. The charges right now are drunk and disorderly and misdemeanor harassment. Hopefully, they won’t add anything else. The Raymond girl’s parents are pretty upset, and they have a lot of friends in the church, so the noise outside isn’t going anywhere. It wouldn’t be so bad for you to stay the rest of the night to wear them out, and post bail early in the morning.”
That was Finn’s advice.
I didn’t expect Finn to say he’d show up himself. I thought he’d send a partner. I called because his firm had been hinting to him for years that they wanted a hook in the Branson case. What’s it like being married to part of the Branson legend? What’s it like having sex with a girl with one leg? The second question they didn’t actually ask, but I always felt was implied. I figured that call to Finn was the least I owed him after my terrible behavior—the opportunity to hand a high-profile case to his partners, the one every defense lawyer in Texas would take without a cent.
“Finn knows,” I say quietly. “About us.” I keep my eyes on the tile.
The chanting is getting more abrasive. I can make out scattered words and phrases. Lizzie and killer and save our girls. Nobody’s tiring out. The avengers outside are the worst kind, the ones in silver cross necklaces, baseball caps, and Life is Good T-shirts. The ones who stay up until midnight to build their first-graders’ Alamo projects out of sugar cubes, cancel a Thanksgiving cruise to bring Grandma some turkey in the hospital, spend a full paycheck on ACL surgery for the family dog. Their love for God and family is just as manic as their hate.
“I don’t know if Trumanell leaves the ranch these days,” I say quietly, “but do not talk to her in here, either. That would make your release much more complicated.”
“What did you do with Angel?” His voice is tight and low. He’s staring intently into my eyes. We’re still out of camera range. I can almost feel Rusty’s itch, hear him cuss, as he stares at a screen with an empty bench.
I lean in close. “Angel got a new eye yesterday. A shiny, beautiful twin. It will change her life. But if anyone asks, you don’t know any angels, not on earth. You don’t pick up girls, ever. You drive a truck. You fix fences. You eat. You sleep.”
My partner’s laugh is drifting through the thin door that separates the patrol room from this cell. It’s the exaggerated one that he brings out for special occasions. It’s a collegial warning that time’s almost up.
18
I’m pacing the tiny cell. Five more minutes have passed, and still no Rusty. I remind myself that no one tickles a suspect like he does.
I think, not for the first time, that Rusty has been tickling me for years.
Rusty has allowed me this much time alone with Wyatt for a reason. It’s not out of gratefulness for all the Dr Peppers I’ve left on his desk at midnight, or for the time I shot a crackhead who sprang out of a bathroom and stuck a .45 to his chest.
Rusty, Wyatt—they are both wasting my time—time I could be using to save a girl with a disturbing mystery who is alive now. And yet I can’t walk out of this cell. I pick up Wyatt’s other hand and scribble again. “This is my cousin Maggie’s number. Very few people have it. She can reach me anytime. Memorize it. Spit on it. Make it disappear. Don’t call or ask for me directly. I don’t want to be officially pulled off the case. Right now, I’m still valuable to Rusty. He thinks I know something. He will be working me.”
I tighten my grip on his hand instead of letting it go. “I can’t explain it,” I say. “But when Rusty called … my only instinct was to protect you. I’m going with it. If you ever loved me, don’t make me wrong.”
With that last line, I’ve summoned up the sixteen-year-old me.
A mistake.
I feel the chill of her in my hand, the one clutching Wyatt’s.
The jail cell is beginning to spin and duplicate—the white squares of linoleum, Wyatt’s face, the faint white graffiti of a hangman’s noose scratched on the wall. I close my eyes, knowing that’s a mistake, too.
The night comes back to me out of nowhere, like it does.
The truck flipped just once, a cage rolling over on a carnival ride. It came to rest in the dark, facing a thin crescent moon. My mangled leg was caught in a jagged glacier of glass. I tried to tug it out with my brain, but the two were no longer attached. I prayed into a black vacuum that someone would find me. God was nowhere.
When they tenderly lifted me into the ambulance, I was a sculpture of ice being delivered to a party. Everybody knew I’d melt in hours, be gone forever. My whole body, as subzero as my hand feels right now.
That’s what I remember.
But, in fact, the moon was full. They told me the truck flipped not once, but at least three times, my leg trapped in the broken window and slamming against the road over and over. According to my uncle the preacher, God was fully present because the veterinarian driving out that way was going slow, looking for a turnoff, out to deliver a breech calf. He saw the wreck, the white of my wrist out a broken window, and applied a tourniquet to my leg or I would have died. My leg was still hooked on until the surgeon got out his saw.
All of us agree on one thing. There was no crying at all, not until I overheard a doctor at the hospital whispering. Amputate. My father said that if he went to hell, the sound I made in that moment was the continuous record that would play.