A Bend in the Road (17 page)

In the car a
few minutes later, the sirens blaring and lights flashing, Miles fishtailed
around a corner, almost losing control of the car, and pressed the accelerator
to the floor again.

He’d dragged
Sims out of the cell and up the stairs, leading him quickly through the office
without stopping to acknowledge the stares. Charlie was in his office on the
phone, and the sight of Miles—his face white—made him hang up, but not soon
enough to stop Miles from reaching the door with Sims. They went out at the
same time, and by the time Charlie reached the sidewalk, Miles and Sims were
heading in opposite directions. Charlie made an instant decision to go after
Miles, and he called after him to stop. Miles ignored him and reached the squad
car.

Charlie picked
up his pace, reaching Miles’s car just as it was pulling out on the street. He
tapped the window even as the car was still moving.  “What’s going on?” Charlie demanded.

Miles waved him
out of the way, and Charlie froze with a look of confusion and disbelief.
Instead of rolling down the window, Miles flicked on the siren, hit the gas,
and tore out of the parking lot, his tires squealing as he turned onto the
street.

A minute later,
when Charlie called on the radio, demanding that Miles let him know what had
happened, Miles didn’t bother to respond. 
From the sheriff’s department, it normally took less than fifteen
minutes to reach the Timson compound. With the siren blaring and the squad car
speeding, it took less than eight minutes—he was already halfway there by the
time Charlie had reached him by radio. On the highway, he hit ninety miles an
hour, and by the time he reached the turnoff to the mobile home where Otis
lived, his adrenaline was pumping. He was holding the wheel hard enough to make
parts of his hands go numb, though in his state he didn’t realize it. Rage was
surging through him, blocking out everything else.

Otis Timson had
hurt his son with a brick.

Otis Timson had
killed his wife.

Otis Timson had
nearly gotten away with it.

On the dirt
drive, Miles’s car slid from side to side as he accelerated again.  The trees he flew past were a blur; he saw
nothing but the road directly in front of him, and as it veered to the right,
Miles finally removed his foot from the accelerator and began to slow the car.
He was almost there.  For two years,
Miles had waited for this moment.

For two years,
he’d tortured himself, lived through the failure.

Otis.

A moment later,
Miles brought the car to a skidding halt in the center of the compound and
pushed his way out of the car. Standing by the open door, he surveyed the area,
watching for movement, watching for anything at all. His jaw was clenched as he
tried to keep control.

He unsnapped his
holster and began moving for his gun.

Otis Timson had
killed his wife.

He’d run her down
in cold blood.

It was ominously
quiet. Aside from the ticking of the engine as it cooled, there were no other
sounds at all. Trees were motionless, their branches absolutely still. No birds
sat chirping on fenceposts. The only sounds that Miles could hear were his own:
the rustle of the gun sliding out of his holster, the harsh rhythm of his
breathing.

It was cold,
the air crisp and cloudless, a spring sky on a winter day.  Miles waited. In time, a screened door
cracked open, squeaking like a rusty squeezebox.

“What do you
want?” a voice rang out. The sound was raspy, as if ravaged by years of smoking
unfiltered cigarettes. Clyde Timson.

Miles lowered
himself, using the car door as a shield in case shots broke out.

“I’m here for
Otis. Bring him out.”

The hand vanished
and the door slapped shut.

Miles slipped the
safety off and found his hand on the trigger, his heart thumping hard. After
the longest minute of his life, he saw the door creak open again, pushed by the
same anonymous hand.

“What’s the
charge?” the voice demanded.

“Get him out
here,now !”

“What for?”

“He’s under
arrest! Now get him out here! Hands above his head!” The door slammed shut again,
and with that, Miles suddenly realized the precarious nature of his position.
In his haste, he’d put himself in danger. 
There were four mobile homes—two in front, one off to each side—and
though he’d seen no one in the others, he knew there were people inside. There
were also countless junked cars, a few on blocks, between the homes, and he
couldn’t help but wonder whether the Timsons were stalling for time, closing in
around him.  Part of him knew he should have
brought help with him; he should call for help now. He didn’t.

No way. Not
now.

In time, the
door pushed open again and Clyde appeared on the doorstep. His hands were by
his side; in one hand he held a cup of coffee, as if things like this happened
every day. When he saw Miles’s gun pointed at him, however, he took a small
step backward.

“What the hell do
you want, Ryan? Otis ain’t done nothin’.”

“I’ve got to
bring him in, Clyde.”

“You still ain’t
said what for yet.”

“He’ll be charged
when he gets to the station.”

“Where’s your
warrant?”

“I don’t need a
warrant for this! He’s under arrest.”

“A man’s got
rights! You can’t come barging in here and making demands. I got rights! And if
you ain’t got no warrant, you get the hell out of here! We’ve had enough of you
and your charges!”

“I’m not kidding
around, Clyde. Get him out here or I’ll have every sheriff in the county here
in a couple of minutes and you’ll all be under arrest for harboring a
criminal.”

It was a bluff,
but somehow it worked. A moment later, Otis appeared from behind the door and nudged
his father. Miles shifted the gun, taking aim at Otis. Like his father, he
didn’t seem particularly worried.

“Step aside,
Daddy,” Otis said calmly. The sight of Otis’s face made Miles want to pull the
trigger. Biting back the wave of choking rage, he raised himself, keeping the
gun pointed at Otis. He began moving around the car, into open view.  “Out here! I want you on the ground!”

Otis moved in
front of his father but stayed on the porch. He crossed his arms.

“What’s the
charge, Deputy Ryan?”

“You know damn
well what the charge is! Now put your hands in the air.”

“I’m afraid I
don’t.”

Despite the
possible danger, which suddenly didn’t matter at all, Miles continued to
approach the house, his gun still pointing at Otis. His finger was on the
trigger and he could feel it tightening.

Make a move. . .
. Just make a move. . . .

“Get down off the
porch!”

Otis glanced at
his father, who looked ready to erupt, but when he turned back to Miles, he saw
an uncontrollable fury in Miles’s eyes that made him step down quickly from the
porch.

“All right, all
right—I’m coming.”

“Hands up! Let me
see your hands in the air.”

By now, a few
others had poked their heads out of their mobile homes and were watching what
was going on. Though rarely on the right side of the law, none of them
considered running for his gun. They too saw the look in Miles’s face, the one
that made it clear that he was looking for any excuse to shoot.  “Get on your knees!Now! ”

Otis did as he
was told, but Miles didn’t holster his gun. Instead he kept it pointed at Otis.
He glanced from side to side, making sure that no one would stop him from what
he was about to do, and closed the gap between them.  Otis had killed his wife.

As he
approached, the rest of the world seemed to vanish. It was just the two of them
now. There was fear and something else—weariness?—in Otis’s eyes, but he said
nothing. Miles paused as they stared at each other, then he began moving slowly
around him, to the back.

He inched the gun
closer to Otis’s head.

Like an executioner.

He could feel the
trigger under his finger. One tug, one quick pull, and this would be over.

God, he wanted
to shoot him, he wanted to end this now. He owed it to Missy, he owed it to
Jonah.

Jonah . . .

The sudden image
of his son brought a burst of reality to what was happening.

No. . .

Still, he debated
for a couple of breaths before finally exhaling hard. He reached for his
handcuffs and slipped them from his belt. With a practiced move, he slipped one
of the cuffs around the nearest of Otis’s upraised wrists, then moved his hand
behind Otis’s back. After holstering his gun, he slipped on the other cuff,
locked them both down until Otis winced, then pulled him up.  “You have the right to remain silent . . .
,” he began, and Clyde, who’d been frozen in place, suddenly exploded into
activity, like an anthill that had been stepped on.

“This ain’t
right. I’m calling my lawyer! You’ve got no right coming in here like this and
pointing your gun that way!”

He continued to
scream long after Miles had finished with the Miranda warning, loaded Otis into
the back of his car, and started toward the highway.

• • •

In the car,
neither Miles nor Otis spoke until they’d reached the highway.  Miles’s eyes remained locked on the road.
Despite the fact that he had Otis in custody, he didn’t want to so much as
glance in the rearview mirror at Otis for fear of what he would do to him.

He’d wanted to
shoot him.

With God as his
witness, he’d wanted to do it.

And one wrong
move, from anyone who’d been out there, and he would have.

But that would
have been wrong.

And you were
wrong in the way you handled it out there. 
How many regulations had he broken? Half a dozen? Letting Sims go,
failing to obtain a warrant, ignoring Charlie, not requesting help, pulling his
gun straight off, putting it to Otis’s head. . . . He was going to catch hell
for this, and not only from Charlie. Harvey Wellman, too. The yellow broken
lines came at him, passing rhythmically from sight.

I don’t care.
Otis is going to jail, no matter what happens to me. Otis will rot away in
prison like he made me rot for two years.

“So what are you
bringing me in for this time?” Otis asked flatly.

“Shut the hell
up,” Miles responded.

“I have a right
to know what the charge is.”

Miles turned
around, stifling the anger that bubbled up in him at the sound of Otis’s voice.
When Miles made no response, Otis continued, oddly calm.  “I’ll let you in on a little secret. I knew
you weren’t going to shoot. You just couldn’t do it.”

Miles bit his
lip, his face turning red. Keep control, he told himself. Keep control. . . .

Otis, however,
went on.

“Tell me, are
you still seeing that girl you were with at the Tavern? I was just wondering,
because—” Miles slammed on the brakes, the wheels screeching, black scars left
on the highway. Because he was unbuckled, Otis shot forward into the safety
cage. Miles pressed the accelerator to the floor again, and like a yo-yo, Otis
was flung back into his seat.

For the rest of
the ride, Otis didn’t say another word.

So what the hell
is going on?” Charlie demanded.

A few minutes
earlier, Miles had shown up with Otis and had walked him through the station
down to one of the holding cells. After locking him in, Otis asked to see his
lawyer, but Miles simply headed back up the stairs to Charlie’s office. Charlie
closed the door behind them; other sheriffs stole quick glances through the
window, trying their best to hide their curiosity.  “I think that seems pretty obvious, doesn’t it?” Miles answered.  “This isn’t the time or place for jokes,
Miles. I need some answers and I need them now, starting with Sims. I want to
know where the paperwork is, why you let him go, and what the hell he meant by
this matter of life and death. And then, I want answers as to why you went
charging out of here and why Otis is locked up downstairs.”

Charlie crossed
his arms and leaned against the desk.

Over the next
fifteen minutes, Miles told him what had happened. Charlie’s jaw dropped open,
and by the end, he was pacing around the office.  “When did all this happen?”

“A couple of
years ago. Sims didn’t remember exactly.”

“But you believed
the rest of it?”

Miles nodded.
“Yeah,” he said. “I believed him. Either he was telling the truth, or he’s the
best actor I’ve ever seen.” In the wake of the adrenaline rush that was slowly
dissipating, Miles felt tired.

“So you let him
go.” A statement, not a question.

“I had to.”

Charlie shook his
head, closing his eyes for a moment. “That wasn’t your call to make. You should
have come to me first.”

“You had to
have been there, Charlie. He wouldn’t have said anything at all if I started
running around here, trying to cut deals with you and Harvey. I made a judgment
call. You might think I was wrong, but in the end I got the answer I needed.”

Charlie looked
out the window, thinking. He didn’t like it. Not at all. And not just the fact
that Miles had overstepped his bounds and there was a whole lot of explaining
to do.

“You got an
answer all right,” he said finally.

Miles looked up.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It just doesn’t
sound right, that’s all. He knows he’s going back to jail

unless he can cut
a deal, and he suddenly has information about Missy?” He

turned to face
Miles. “Where was he the last couple of years? There’s been a

reward, and you
know how Sims earns his money. Why hasn’t he come forward before

now?”

He hadn’t thought
of that. “I don’t know. Maybe he was afraid.”

Charlie’s eyes
darted toward the ground.Or maybe he’s lying now.

Miles seemed to
read Charlie’s mind.

“Look, we’ll go
talk to Earl Getlin. If he corroborates the story, we could cut a deal so he
testifies.”

Charlie said
nothing. Christ, this was a mess.

“He ran down my
wife, Charlie.”

“Sims
saysthatOtis said he ran down your wife. There’s a big difference between the
two, Miles.”

“You know my history
with Otis.”

Charlie turned,
holding up his hands. “Of course I do. I know every part of it.  And that’s why Otis’s alibi was among the
first we checked out, or don’t you remember that? There were witnesses that put
him at his house the night of the accident.”

“They were his
brothers. . . .”

Charlie shook
his head in frustration. “Even though you weren’t in on the investigation, you
know how hard we looked for an answer. We aren’t a bunch of buffoons running
around here, and neither are the men at the highway patrol. We all know how to
investigate a crime, and we did it right, because we wanted the answer as badly
as you did. We talked to the right people, we sent the right information into
the state labs. But nothing tied Otis to this thing—nothing.” “You don’t know
that.”

“I’m a lot more
sure of it than I am of what you’re telling me,” he answered. He drew a deep
breath. “I know this thing has eaten you up since it happened, and you know
what? It’s eaten me up, too. And if it had happened to me, I would have acted
the same way you are. I would have gone crazy had someone run down Brenda and
gotten away with it. I probably would have looked for answers on my own, too.
But you know what?”

He stopped,
making sure that Miles was listening to him. 
“I wouldn’t have believed the first story that came my way that promised
an answer, especially if it was from a guy like Sims Addison. Think about who
you’re talking about here.Sims Addison. That guy would turn on his own mother if
he could get money for it. When his own freedom is at stake, how far do you
think he’d be willing to go?”

“This isn’t about Sims—”

“Of course it
is. He didn’t want to go back to prison, and he was willing to say anything to
ensure that. Doesn’t that make more sense than what you’re telling me?”

“He wouldn’t
lie to me about this.”

Charlie met
Miles’s gaze. “And why not? Because it’s too personal? Because it means too
much? Because it’s too important? Did you ever stop to think that he knew what
it would take to get you to let him out of here? He’s not stupid, despite his
boozing habit. He’d say anything to get himself out of trouble, and from the
looks of it, that’s exactly what happened.”

“You weren’t
there when he told me. You didn’t see his face.” “No? To tell you the truth, I
don’t think I had to be there. I can imagine exactly how it went. But let’s
just say you’re right, okay? Say Sims was telling you the truth—and let’s
totally disregard the fact that you were wrong in letting him go without
talking to me or to Harvey, okay? Then what? You said that he overheard people
talking. That he wasn’t even a witness.” “He doesn’t have to be.”

“Oh, come on,
Miles. You know the rules. In court, that’s nothing more than hearsay. You
don’t have a case.”

“Earl Getlin
can testify.”

“Earl Getlin?
Who’s gonna believe him? One look at his tattoos and his rap sheet and there
goes half the jury. Throw in the deal I’m sure he’ll want, and there goes the
other half.” He paused. “But you’re forgetting something important, Miles.”

“What’s that?”

“What if Earl
doesn’t back it up?”

“He will.”

“But what if he
doesn’t?”

“Then we’ll have
to get Otis to confess.”

“And you think
he’ll do that?”

“He’ll confess.”

“You mean if you
lean on him hard enough . . .”

Miles stood up,
not wanting to listen anymore. “Look, Charlie—Otis killed Missy, it’s as simple
as that. You might not want to believe it, but maybe you guys did overlook
something back then, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let it go now.” He
reached for the door. “I’ve got a prisoner to interrogate—” With a swing,
Charlie caught the door, closing it.

“I don’t think
so, Miles. Right now, I think it would be best if you stay out of this for a
little while.”

“Stay out of it?”

“Yeah.Stay. Out.
Of. It. That’s an order. I’ll take it from here.”

“We’re talking
about Missy, Charlie.”

“No. We’re
talking about a deputy who overstepped his bounds and shouldn’t have gotten
involved in the first place.”

They stood eye
to eye for a long moment before Charlie finally shook his head.

“Look, Miles, I
understand what you’re going through, but you’re out of it now.  I’ll talk to Otis, I’ll find Sims and talk
to him, too. And I’ll make a trip up to see Earl. And as for you, I think you
should probably head on home. Take the rest of the day off.”

“I just started my shift—”

“And now you’re
finished.” Charlie reached for the doorknob. “Now go on, go home. Let me handle
this, okay?”

• • •

He still didn’t
like it.

Twenty minutes
later, sitting in his office, Charlie wasn’t convinced.  He’d been a sheriff for almost thirty years,
and he’d learned to trust his instincts. And his instincts now were flashing
like strobe lights, cautioning him to be careful.

Right now, he
wasn’t even sure quite where to start. Otis Timson, probably, since he was
downstairs, but he really wanted to talk to Sims first. Miles said he was
certain that Sims was telling the truth, but for Charlie, that wasn’t quite
enough.

Not now. Not in
these circumstances.

Not when it was
about Missy.

Charlie had
witnessed firsthand the struggle that Miles went through after Missy died. God,
they’d been in love. Like two young kids, they couldn’t keep their eyes and
hands off each other. Hugging and kissing, holding hands, flirty looks—it was
like no one ever bothered to tell them that marriage was supposed to be hard.
It hadn’t even changed when Jonah came along, for God’s sake. Brenda used to
joke that Miles and Missy would probably be making out in a nursing home, fifty
years from now.

And when she
died? If it wasn’t for Jonah, Miles probably would have joined her.  As it was, he practically killed himself
anyway. Drinking too much, smoking, losing sleep, losing weight. For a long
time, all he could think about was the crime.

The crime. Not an
accident. Not in Miles’s mind. Always thecrime.

Charlie tapped a
pencil on the desk.

Here we go again.

He knew all about
Miles’s investigation, and despite his better judgment, he’d looked the other
way. Harvey Wellman had cursed up and down when he’d learned about it, but so
what? They both knew Miles wouldn’t have stopped his search, no matter what
Charlie had said; if it had come right down to it, Miles would have turned in
his badge and kept investigating on his own.

He had, though,
been able to keep him away from Otis Timson. Thank God for that.  There was something between those two,
something more than the normal tension between good guys and bad guys. All
those stunts the Timsons had pulled—Charlie didn’t need proof to know who’d
done it—were a big part of it. But combine it with Miles’s tendency to arrest
the Timsons first and figure the rest out later, and it became a combustible
mix.

Could Otis have
run down Missy Ryan?

Charlie
pondered that. Possible. . . but though Otis had something of a chip on his
shoulder and got into a few fights, he had never crossed the line. So far.  At least that they could prove. Besides,
they’d quietly checked him out. Miles had insisted on it, but Charlie was
already a step ahead of him. Was it possible they’d missed something?

He grabbed a
pad and, as was his habit, started jotting down his thoughts, trying to keep
them straight.

Sims Addison.
Was he lying?

He’d given good
information in the past. In fact, it had always been good. But this was
different. He wasn’t doing this for money now, and the stakes were a lot
higher. He was doing it to save himself. Did that make him more likely to tell
the truth? Or less?

Charlie had to
have a talk with him. Today, if possible. Tomorrow at the latest.

Back to the pad.
He jotted the next name.

Earl Getlin. What
was he going to say?

If he didn’t
corroborate, end of subject. Let Otis out of jail and spend the next year
convincing Miles that Otis was innocent—at least of this particular crime. But
if he did corroborate, then what? With his record, he wasn’t exactly the most
believable witness in the world. And he’d no doubt want something in return,
which never played well to the jury.

Either way,
Charlie had to talk to him right away.

Charlie moved
Earl to the top of the list and jotted another name.

Otis Timson.
Guilty or not?

If he’d killed
Missy, Sims’s story made sense, but then what? Hold him while they investigated
openly this time, looking for additional evidence? Let him go and do the same
thing? No matter what, Harvey wouldn’t look too kindly on a case that relied
solely on Sims Addison and Earl Getlin. But after two years, what could they
hope to find?

He had to look
into it, no doubt about it. As much as he didn’t think they’d find anything,
he’d have to start the investigation again. For Miles. For himself.

Charlie shook
his head.

Okay, assuming
Sims was telling the truth and Earl backed him up—a big assumption, but
possible—why would Otis have said it? The obvious answer was that he’d said it
because he’d done it. If so, it was back to the problems of building a case again.
But . . .

It took a moment
for the thought to coalesce into the form of a question.

But what if Sims
was telling the truth? And what if Otis was lying that night?

Is that possible?

Charlie closed
his eyes, thinking.

If so, why?

For his
reputation?Look what I did and got away with. . . .

To scare Earl
into getting the money?This will happen to you, unless . . .  Or had he meant to say that he’d simply
arranged it but hadn’t done the dirty work himself?

His thoughts
circled and zigzagged from one extreme to the next as he considered them.

But how the hell
would he have known she’d be out jogging that night?

This whole thing
was a mess.

Getting nowhere,
he set aside the pencil and rubbed his temples, knowing there was more to
consider than the situation with just those three.  What was he going to do about Miles?

His friend. His
deputy.

Cutting a deal
with Sims and losing the paperwork? Letting him go? Then charging out like this
was the Wild West to bring Otis to justice without even bothering to talk to Earl
Getlin?

Harvey wasn’t a
bad guy, but he was going to have problems with this. Serious problems.

They all were.

Charlie sighed.
“Hey, Madge?” he called out.

The secretary
popped her head into the office. Plump and graying, she’d been around almost as
long as he had and knew everything that went on in the department. He wondered
if she’d been listening.