Chapter Thirty-three
T
he parade route ended at the top of the hill on South Main. Honking his horn, Pootie eased the Goober Mobile into a parking place under an oak tree on the west side of the square and turned off the engine. There was a bare patch in the grass where Jeb Hannah had sat before the demon picked him up and plunked him on Muddy’s front lawn. The roving statue caused quite a sensation. The story was picked up by the Associated Press. A photographer from Paulsberg was taking pictures of people in the shallow depression.
There were long lines at the inflatable moon walk and the water slide the city brought in for the festival. Parents and children swarmed around the Conecuh Sausage vendor and the snow cone machine. Folks gathered around the Goober Mobile, admiring Pootie and his ride and having their picture taken with the most successful Double G in Peanut Festival history. Pootie was on Cloud Nine.
Leaving Pootie to enjoy his big moment, Addy and Brand wandered over to the snow cone vendor. Addy was trying to work up the courage to try the new boiled peanut–flavored shaved ice when the chief’s patrol car pulled up and Bitsy and the chief got out. Bitsy was a vision of goober couture in a pale yellow linen boat-neck shell and a pair of matching cropped pants with little brown peanuts embroidered on the hem.
“Hey,” Bitsy said, waving. The temperature was in the nineties but she looked as cool and unwilted as the flowers Addy kept refrigerated at the shop. “Y’all get something to drink and meet me and Car-lee under that tree.”
Addy took Bitsy’s timely arrival as a sign from God that she was not meant to ingest a frozen dessert that tasted like peanut-y brine and dragged Brand over to a lemonade stand. They purchased two big glasses of lemonade and joined Bitsy and the chief in the shade of a huge sweet gum tree.
“Get out of the sun, you two,” Chief Davis said. “It’s hotter’n a goat’s butt in a pepper patch.”
Hard to believe her persnickety, socially nice mother was dating a good ole boy who talked about goat butts. Really, those two had about as much in common as . . . as a small-town hick florist and a sexy drop-dead-gorgeous immortal demon hunter. The universe was a strange and random place.
“Thanks.” Addy took a seat on the circular bench that surrounded the tree.
Bitsy smiled up at Brand. “Don’t you want to sit down, Mr. Dalvahni?”
“Thank you,” Brand said. “I will stand.”
He stalked to the edge of the circle of shade, his hard gaze on the people swarming around the little park. Now that the parade was over, he seemed edgy and tense. His mood was contagious. Addy thought about the guy on the street with the wide, creepy grin. Was the demon watching them? Did Brand sense it? She looked around. Parents stood in line with cranky children, waiting their turn on the moon walk and the water slide. People crowded around the snow cone and lemonade booths and the Conecuh Sausage guy was doing a land-office business, but she didn’t see any purple-eyed whoozits. This was silly. Brand’s stone-faced warrior routine was making her jumpy. She needed to think about something else. She needed a puzzle or a problem to gnaw on.
Like who made God or where does space end, and what comes after that? If light has a speed, does dark? What exactly is Spam made of, and why isn’t there a product called Spicken or Speef or Splamb or Spish?
Nah, she needed something truly incomprehensible and perverse to ponder so she wouldn’t think about Mr. Nasty.
Like her mother.
Sipping her drink, Addy contemplated Mama. The Bitsy she knew and loved was wound too tight. But today Mama seemed relaxed and freer. Probably had something to do with Mama saying the “F” word. Who knew how long that word had been fermenting inside Mama, swelling and growing and straining to get out? It was a miracle the woman hadn’t erupted years ago from the pressure, swear words rat-a-tat-tatting out of her mouth at machine gun speed, her size four body slamming up and down like a jackhammer.
Mama looked younger today, too. Why, saying that one “F” word had knocked ten years off her age, living proof that a person ought to indulge in a little judicious cussing now and then. In private, of course, and under the right circumstances. Profanity lost its zing if overused. If Mama had done more closet cussing last night’s unfortunate episode might not have happened, and Mama wouldn’t have forfeited her crown of perfect Southern Lady-tude.
Tragic.
“You seen Shep this morning, Mama?” Addy asked.
“No, I haven’t. I was about to ask you the same thing, Addy. I—”
Whump, wump, wump,
Shep and Lenora drove up in the coffin car. People mobbed the modified Roadster, pointing and asking questions.
Bitsy leaped up. “What in heaven’s name is that?”
“It’s a coffin car, Mama,” Addy said. “Shep and Rat Godwin built it in Rat’s garage.”
“He’s got that floozy with him again.” Bitsy pointed at the thrall. “What’s that she’s wearing, a bunch of string?”
“I think it’s supposed to be a dress,” Addy said.
“It’s indecent, that’s what it is. Shep is having some sort of crisis. I’m going to have a talk with him.”
The chief rose and took her gently by the arm. “Shep’s a grown man, Hibiscus. He don’t need his mama running his life.”
“But—”
“No buts, Little Bit. Leave him alone.”
Bitsy was still huffing and puffing like a calliope when a blue Jeep Cherokee with the word SHERIFF emblazoned in big silver letters on the side pulled up to the curb and parked behind Chief Davis’s patrol car.
“It’s somebody from the sheriff’s department.” Addy set her lemonade down on the bench and got to her feet. “Reckon what they want?”
A tall, broad-shouldered man wearing mirrored Ray-Bans got out of the SUV and looked around. He spotted the chief under the tree and started toward them, moving with a rangy grace that had female heads bobbing up and down like a colony of meerkats.
Brand strode over to stand next to the chief. “You know this man?” he asked.
“Sure, that’s Dev Whitsun, the new sheriff.” The chief grunted. “Wonder what he wants.”
Bitsy gave the man approaching them a squinty-eyed stare. “That’s the new sheriff?”
Uh oh. Addy knew that look. Mama was matchmaking again, looking for a back-up in case things didn’t work out with Brand. Mama was all about the Plan B.
Bitsy sidled up to her. “He’s a real nice-looking man, isn’t he? According to Jeannine down at the Kut ’N’ Kurl, he’s single. He’s got a steady job . . . for the next four years, anyway. And the county gives good benefits. Sick leave and health insurance and a nice retirement package.”
“Forget it, Mama.”
“But don’t you think he’s handsome?”
“Yeah, but I’m not interested.”
“I declare, Adara Jean, you are too picky. That sheriff is a real catch. If you two got married you could stay here, not run off to Europe with Mr. Dalvahni.”
Europe? Oh, good grief. Mama thought Brand was European. Okay, so maybe that was the teensy weeniest bit her fault, but what choice did she have? She could hardly tell Mama her new boyfriend was not from Earth. But, Mama thought Brand would take Addy away, and that was not a good thing. Mama Hen liked her chickens close to the nest.
Right now she seemed to have her heart set on fixing Addy up with the sheriff. Mama was as tenacious as a badger. If she latched her jaws around a bachelor morsel by the name of Dev Whitsun, neither man nor God could tear her loose.
“I don’t care how hot the guy is, Mama,” Addy said. “I love Brand.”
Oh, crap, she said the “L” word. For days, she’d held it in. But the damn thing slipped out anyway. Maybe it was like that “F” word Mama had been sitting on all these years. Lurking on the back of her tongue, waiting for the right moment, and then—
bam!
—springing forth like a dog freed from a kennel.
Love.
Man, she was so going to get her heart busted all to pieces.
Bitsy sighed. “I was afraid of that. Have you told him?”
“No.”
“Adara Jean! What are you waiting for, a sign from the Lord God Almighty? If you love the man, you ought to tell him.”
“I know, I know. I’m going to. Things have been crazy.”
Sheriff Whitsun walked up and shook the chief’s hand. He looked Brand up and down, his eyes unreadable behind the mirrored sunglasses. Chief Davis introduced Brand to the sheriff. The sheriff said something in a low voice to the chief. Addy edged nearer. Mama scooted closer, too.
“—warn you,” Sheriff Whitsun was saying. “Sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings, but I thought you’d want to know.”
He glanced at Addy and Bitsy and muttered something in the chief’s ear. Brand’s lips thinned. Whatever the sheriff said, Brand didn’t like it.
“Thanks, Dev,” Chief Davis said. “I appreciate the heads-up. You need any help, you let me know.”
“I’ll do that,” Sheriff Whitsun said. “The news has gone out over the wire. The State Troopers are on the lookout, and the sheriff’s departments in Monroe and Escambia counties have sent men. We’ll catch the sum bitches.” His head turned in their direction, his eyes hidden behind the Ray-Bans. “Excuse my French, ladies.”
Bitsy gave him a sugary smile. “That’s quite all right, Sheriff.”
With a curt nod, he walked back to his Jeep, climbed in, and drove off.
Bitsy gave Addy a sideways glance. “Easy on the eyes and smells like heaven, too. Sure you don’t want to change your mind, Addy?”
“Positive.”
Bitsy shrugged. “Oh, well. What did the sheriff want, Car-lee?”
The chief pushed his hat back. “Been a prison break. Six convicts busted out of Newsome Correctional Facility last night. Killed three guards in the process. Soon as they got out, they robbed a convenience store over by Jordan’s Crossing. Killed the owner and two customers. Dev said the place looked like somebody butchered a hog. Forensics guys are having a hard time identifying the bodies.”
Bitsy gasped. “Oh, my goodness, how horrible! What if those terrible men come to Hannah?”
The chief put his arm around Bitsy. “Relax, Hibiscus. That scum is a hundred miles away from here by now.”
Dan Curtis barreled around the square in Muddy’s convertible and screeched to a stop.
Muddy sat up and straightened her hat. “Yi-ha, ride ’em cowboy,” she yelled into the megaphone.
Dan Curtis leaped out of the convertible and loped across the grass.
Chief Davis watched him approach, his expression sour. “What’s that damn fool up to now?”
Officer Dan’s eyes were alight with excitement. “Alarm’s going off at the First National Bank, Chief. Probably a squirrel in the wiring again, but I thought I’d better tell you.”
“God almighty.” The chief threw his hat on the ground. “If this ain’t the damndest town. Wandering statues and burgling squirrels.” He picked up his hat and jammed it back on his head. “Well, don’t stand there, Officer Curtis. Let’s go arrest some rodents.”
Muddy climbed out of the convertible. She was wearing purple high-top Converse tennis shoes that matched her purple skirt and silk blouse. “I’m coming with you. I always wanted to ride in a police car.”
Officer Dan adjusted his gun holster. “You can’t come, Miss Muddy. This here is official police business.”
His officer-of-the-law persona would have been a lot more impressive without the big purple hat.
“Oh, let her come along.” The chief shook a warning finger at Muddy. “But you’re staying in the car while we check this bank thing out, understood?”
“Ten-four,” Muddy shouted into the megaphone.
“God almighty,” the chief said again.
They jumped in the chief’s patrol car, Muddy in the back, and sped off.
Bitsy sighed. “Oh, dear, I do hope they’ll be all right. You know how Muddy is.”
“They’ll be fine, Mama,” Addy said. “Like the chief said, it’s a bunch of squirrels. You know nothing exciting happens around here.”
What was she saying? That might have been true five days ago, but it sure as shoot wasn’t true anymore. Sleepy, boring little Hannah had turned out to be a sinkhole of weirdness.
As if the cosmos were attuned to her thoughts, she heard a low rumble from the direction of the river. The sound was too steady to be thunder. It grew louder, coalescing into the excited murmuring of many voices.
The white stag trotted up the broad, azalea-lined steps that went from the park down to the river, Hannah’s version of the Spanish Steps in Rome. The stag’s antlers shone in the sun. A mob of exultant, shouting people came up the stairs behind him. The men in the horde, and a few of the women, too, looked wild eyed and feverish. Addy knew that look: hunting fever. Screw the fact this deer was one-of-a-kind in its magnificence; didn’t matter. It had silver antlers and glowed like a nuclear reactor; didn’t matter. Deer season was long past. That didn’t matter, either. The granddaddy of all deer was in Hannah, and every bubba and bubbette with a gun or a hunting bow wanted to shoot that sucker and hang it on a wall.