It doesn’t elude me that Adam is giving Gina as much attention as he’s giving the calf.
“Well, he may be cute,” she says, “but I’m not giving up my room for him.”
Adam laughs outright, then turns his attention to the children. “Spread the rest of that straw on the floor. I think things are going to get messy in here tonight.”
Gina looks at the calf as if he’s suddenly not quite so cute. “Oh. He’s going to—”
“Yeah,” I say.
Adam and I catch each other’s gazes and his eyes slide to Gina. “You want to feed him?”
“Ah … you know, I’m good.”
But I’m already shifting aside, nudging the pail into the hand of her uninjured arm. “Tilt it slightly,” I tell her. “Like this. Make sure the nipple is at the right angle. I’ll help you.”
“Hold my beer and watch this,” she mutters as she takes hold of the bucket.
The calf nudges the pail, and she hefts a laugh. “Wow. He’s a hungry little squirt.”
“You’re a natural,” Adam tells her.
“Look at him go,” she whispers.
“His name’s Leroy,” Sammy reminds us as he kicks straw around, spreading it.
“I dated a Leroy once,” Gina murmurs. “He wasn’t nearly as cute as this little guy.”
That’s when I notice that everyone’s watching the calf—except for Adam. His eyes are on Gina.
CHAPTER 11
A few minutes later, while the children are helping Adam set up a cot for Sammy in the mudroom, so the boy can “keep an eye on the calf” overnight, Gina and I stand in the living room at the front window, looking out at the storm.
“So what’s the story on Adam?” she asks.
“I’ve known him since I was a kid. We lost touch when I left. He’s a good guy.”
“I haven’t seen a wife.”
“She died.” I look at her, wondering about her curiosity. “They used a midwife here at the house and there was some kind of medical emergency during childbirth.”
“Did the kid…”
I shake my head. “A baby boy. He didn’t make it.”
“That’s a tough break,” she says. “Losing two people in one day. How long ago did she die?”
“A couple years,” I reply, remembering the funeral, a stone-faced Adam, and the utter silence of the children as they’d clung to him and watched their mamm laid to rest for all of eternity.
“The Amish believe in life beyond death,” I tell her. “That’s a comfort when you lose someone.”
“I’ve never been big on the whole faith thing.”
I offer her a half smile. “If you were Amish I suspect you’d get excommunicated pretty quickly.”
She laughs. “You know, Kate, for an Amish dude, Adam’s a nice-looking guy. Is he—”
“He’s off-limits,” I say before she can finish.
She stares at me, weighing my response. “Well, damn, Burkholder, it’s not like I’m going to jump his bones or something.”
When I say nothing, she moves closer to the window, parts the covering, and peers outside. “For what it’s worth, I don’t do that anymore.”
“He’s from a different world than we are,” I tell her. “He’s religious. There are a lot of rules. People making judgments. That’s all I’m going to say about it.”
“Forget I asked.” Sighing, she looks out at the snow. “Any idea how much longer this damn storm is going to last?”
“I checked the weather app on my cell a couple hours ago. It’s supposed to let up tomorrow.”
“If someone finds that truck, it won’t take them long to find me.”
“We’ll get to it as soon as we can. Pull you out of the ditch and bring it back here. As it is now, we don’t even know when the roads will be passable.”
At the mention of the coming day, the weight of the situation we face settles over me, as dark and cold as the storm outside. “We’re going to have to make some decisions,” I tell her. “Figure out how to handle this. Do you have an attorney?”
She shakes her head. “Never needed one.”
“You do now. A good one.”
Giving a final look at the whiteout conditions, she drops the window covering and faces me. “They’re going to bury me, Kate. They’re going to frame me for murdering Eddie Cysco. They’re going to produce or manipulate evidence to back up whatever story they decide to push and they’re going to make it convincing. They won’t stop there. They’re going to pile everything they can on me.”
I stare at her, part of me believing her and wanting to help. Another part resists the urge to shake her, shout at her, tell her she never should have compromised herself or gotten involved with cops she knew were corrupt.
“You haven’t exactly helped your cause,” I tell her.
“If I could take back what I did, I would.” With a dry laugh, she says, “We both know you don’t get a do-over.” She blows out a sound of anguish. “Jesus Christ, the thought of jail time gives me the shudders.”
Even if she manages to garner immunity in exchange for information or testimony, she will never be fully exonerated. She’ll never work as a cop again. The stain of her past deeds will follow her the rest of her life.
“I suspect in the coming days, the investigators at BCI will want to talk to you,” I tell her. “If the FBI is involved, they’ll want to talk to you, too.”
“Yeah, well, they’re going to have to make me some kind of deal,” she says. “Maybe I ought to just run.”
We fall silent, the words zinging, all the things that could happen in the coming days playing in my head like some movie trailer and a story that doesn’t have a happy ending.
“Your credibility is a problem,” I tell her.
“What’s really scary is that these cops have the power to lay a dozen more crimes on me. Crimes that I had nothing to do with. Things they themselves did. They have access to everything. The ability to manipulate evidence. Intimidate people. You name it.”
I think about that a moment. “Is there someone you trust who might come forward or corroborate any of this?”
“I’ve been racking my brain.” Her laugh is a humorless sound fraught with hopelessness. “Pretty sad when you can count the number of people you trust on one hand.”
I wait.
“There’s a patrol cop,” she says. “He’s a decent guy. Has a family. I don’t know him well, but we’ve talked. I don’t know how involved he is. But I do know he’s privy to some of what’s going on. I got the impression he doesn’t approve of what he’s been seeing. He’s a rookie. Doesn’t want to screw up his career.”
“Does Mr. Decent Guy have a name?”
“Jack Tyson.”
“Why didn’t you tell Tomasetti about him?”
“Tyson is a long shot.” She offers a crooked smile. “Now that I’ve had sufficient time to entertain the notion that this is the end of my life as I know it, I realized if there was ever a good time for desperate measures this is it.”