Countdown (13 page)

Drew could feel the tears welling up again and, despite what his partner had just said, he opted not to get caught blubbering yet again. There might not be no shame, Drew thought, but it was as embarrassing as hell.

My cell phone rang and I dug it out of my pocket and said, ‘Kovak.’

The new coroner identified himself.

‘Hey,’ I greeted him. ‘You got any results?’

‘Nary a one. Figure it must be like poison or something ’cause he didn’t have a mark on him anywhere. So I gotta send him to the state lab. They got all the stuff to do a real autopsy, know what I mean?’

‘The two former MEs were able to do a “real autopsy,”’ I said, putting some emphasis on the ‘real autopsy’ comment.

‘Well, Milt, they were doctors. I’m a mortician. The county knew what they were getting when they voted me in! They wanna pay me less than a real MD, then they’re gonna get somebody who ain’t a real MD! Know what I mean?’

I sighed. ‘Just send the body to the state guys then—’

‘Already done. Sent him out half an hour ago. But I gotta tell you, Milt, the lady that answered the phone said they were backlogged and it could be a couple of days,’ the new coroner said.

‘Wonderful,’ I said. ‘Just fucking wonderful.’ I hung up the phone.

I went out the front door of the Longbranch Inn and glanced at the sky in all directions, thinking, well, if that tornado was heading here, it was taking its own sweet time. There’d been some rain, and a little lightning and thunder that I could see and hear from the restaurant of the Longbranch Inn, but the rain had stopped and the clouds were dispersing. I put my hands in my pockets and started walking around the inn, thinking.

Fact: Darrell Blanton was dead.

Fact: Eunice Blanton held my wife and seven other – make that eight, or would it be nine by now? – people hostage.

Fact: One of those people was an undercover policeman.

Fact: We had no reinforcements coming – because of my own stupidity.

Fact: Dalton Pettigrew was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

Fact: Emmett Hopkins was probably thinking about running against me come election time.

Fact: I had not one good idea.

Not one. And my wife, the love of my life, was upstairs in that hell hole with so many loves of so many other lives, and I couldn’t get her out. I couldn’t tell Eunice Blanton the truth about her boy. She’d go ape-shit. Or would she? I thought it would be really nice to talk this over with Jean. Her being a psychiatrist and all, maybe she could get a handle on this. But I really couldn’t tell the old bat that her son was dead! Or could I? I looked at my watch. Four minutes.

Bobby Potter, Matt’s father, was a civil engineer who had to inspect sites and buildings and what have you. Therefore, the back of his Suburban was loaded with the tools of his trade. There was a box of flashlights in varying sizes – everything from a huge hand-held searchlight to a tiny mag light and everything in between. He handed out the flashlights and then began handing out tools.

‘I’ll take the sledge hammer, as I’m the biggest,’ Bobby said. ‘Here, Carolyn, take this pick ax; Harmon, you bring the first aid kit,’ he said, hauling out the biggest first aid kit any of them had ever seen.

And they headed to the end of the cul-de-sac, to the path that led around the last house, across the greenbelt and into the woods, their lights shining brightly on the devastation in front of them.

‘Oh my God,’ Carolyn breathed. ‘Our boys are in here somewhere?’

Harmon Monk patted her shoulder. ‘They’re OK, Carolyn. I can feel it. They’re OK.’

‘From your mouth to God’s ear,’ Carolyn said as they trudged deeper into the woods.

They took turns shouting out the names of their missing children, the lights sweeping the trees and debris. It didn’t take long before they literally tripped over a bike. Actually, it was Bobby, in the lead, who did the tripping.

‘Well mother-fu—’ he started. Then said, ‘Excuse me, Carolyn.’

‘What is it?’ she asked, shining her light on the object that had tripped Bobby.

‘It’s a bike!’ Bobby said. ‘My daughter’s bike.’

‘Your daughter?’ Harmon said. ‘But she wasn’t home when this came down. She’s at your house now.’

‘So what if Matt and Johnny Mac decided to go do something stupid – like come in here,’ Bobby said, flashing his light around, ‘and they needed bikes. But Johnny Mac doesn’t have one at your house, right?’

‘Right,’ Harmon answered. ‘So he’d borrow Miranda’s and follow Matt in here.’

‘Hey, now!’ Bobby said. ‘We don’t know who followed who!’

‘Sorry,’ Harmon said. ‘They’re in here, all three of ’em, and that’s a fact. And we found one girl’s bike—’

‘And a pair of Nikes,’ Carolyn said, coming back from a slight detour and carrying the shoes. ‘Anybody recognize these?’

Both men shook their heads. ‘They could have come from anywhere,’ Harmon said, ‘and just got dropped in here when the twister came over.’

‘Yeah, but hold on to ’em,’ Bobby advised. ‘We might run into a barefooted boy.’

Carolyn stuck the child-sized shoes in the back pockets of her jeans and followed the men further into the woods.

Eunice Blanton was still staring out the window at the county courthouse across the street. She thought she’d like to sit down, but figured she’d better not. Don’t let ’em think they got you down, girl, she told herself. But truth be known, Eunice was tired. She was going to be seventy years old next week – not that her children noticed – and what with the sugar diabetes, things weren’t exactly looking up. No matter how many times she poked herself and smeared her blood in that little doohickey the doctor gave her, the numbers still came out real high – like in the two-hundred range. One thing she did know was that it was supposed to be from eighty to one hundred and twenty. So she wasn’t doing so hot. But if she went to the doctor about it he’d probably make her take them damn insulin shots. Lord knew, poking her fingers four times a day was bad enough, but shooting herself with a needle? Uh uh. Wasn’t gonna happen.

She missed her boy. She missed Darrell. Darrell always made her laugh. Earl just made her want to hit him most times. Marge? Eunice mentally shrugged. Marge wasn’t such a much. She shoulda been a boy. Three boys woulda been great. But the first baby, right out of the chute, ended up a girl. Seemed like everybody in Blantonville was whispering about that. Her having a girl. What was she thinking of? Of course, weren’t nothing she coulda done about it. It was in God’s hands.

Marge moved in with Eunice when Marge’s own husband died, saying she wanted to take care of her mama, but Eunice knew it was really because that worthless husband of hers didn’t leave her a pot to piss in. And then Eunice ends up practically raising Chandra all on her lonesome. Marge didn’t even work. But with Eunice’s social security, and the social security disability Marge got from her dead husband, they did OK. ’Course, half the time Earl stayed with them, whenever he lost a job and missed his rent and got kicked out on his butt, and of course he never offered a dime. Sometimes he’d bring home a rabbit or a squirrel or, on rare occasions, a deer, but other than that he didn’t do much for his keep.

But her Darrell! Now there was a real man! He worked hard to bring home the bacon to his family, had his own double-wide on twenty acres of prime real estate his daddy had left him and took good care of his family. Well, except for accidentally shooting his wife, of course. And Eunice knew in her heart that Joynell had somehow been asking for it. She’d never liked Joynell. She thought she was all hot stuff ’cause her family didn’t marry their relatives. But she was just a hairnet working at the elementary school outside Blantonville when Darrell found her. Not like she was such a much, either.

Shit, Eunice thought, when it came to daughters and daughters-in-law she wasn’t exactly batting a thousand. And then the little missy, her granddaughter Chandra, goes and gets herself pregnant, and dollars to donuts it wasn’t a Blanton who’d done the deed. Now she thinks she’s all high and mighty carrying a child, who, rightfully, shouldn’t have the Blanton name.

Eunice glanced over at Chandra, sitting away from the rest of them, holding her belly like she was the first girl in history to be knocked-up. Then Eunice noticed the girl was looking a little green around the gills. From her spot by the window, Eunice called out, ‘Chandra! You sick?’

Chandra looked up at the old lady. ‘I don’t rightly know, Mee-maw, but I think this baby is fixin’ to come.’

Emmett found me standing up against the wall of the Longbranch Inn opposite the county courthouse. I was standing against the wall because I didn’t want the old bat to see me if she happened to look out the window. Emmett saddled up to me.

‘Got a light?’ he said. Since neither of us smoked – any more, that is – I just looked at him.

‘A little levity,’ Emmett said and sighed. ‘Very little, I guess.’

‘You got that right,’ I said, staring at the courthouse.

‘I didn’t mean to undermine you in there,’ he said.

I glanced at him but he was staring at the courthouse, too. So I went back to staring at it. ‘No real harm,’ I said.

‘What the fuck are we gonna do, Milt?’ he said, and I could tell his real emotions were showing. Emmett had had a lot of loss in his life – first his son who had died of leukemia, then his first wife who had blew her brains out with his service revolver – and he didn’t need any more. Besides, Petal, his little girl, who was a year younger than my Johnny Mac, needed her daddy – just like Johnny Mac needed his mama. And, hell, Anthony deserved to see his child born, and Dalton deserved to get married and start a family, and everybody up there had people who loved them and wanted them back safe. And I wasn’t doing a damn thing to see to that.

‘I’m thinking of calling up ol’ Eunice and telling her that her boy’s dead. What do you think?’ I finally caught his eye.

He looked at me a long moment, shrugged, looked back at the courthouse and said, ‘It’s something to do.’

‘My thinking exactly,’ I said. I looked at my watch. Two minutes.

‘Marge! For gawd’s sake, see to your girl!’ Eunice bellowed from her stance at the window. ‘If it’s more of them Braxton-Hicks thingies, she just needs to go lie down in the bedroom and stop with all the drama!’

‘Mee-maw!’ Chandra cried. ‘I’m not doing drama! I’m hurting real bad here!’

‘Huh!’ Mee-maw responded. ‘That baby don’t look more’n seven or eight pounds. Your stupid uncle Earl was fourteen pounds. Liked to rip me to shreds!’

‘That why you don’t like me, Mama?’ Earl asked, standing in the middle of the room, shotgun by his side and his head down, a wayward tear dropping from his eye to the carpet.

‘I don’t like you ’cause you’re worthless, Earl! I done forgave you for ripping me up. Had to go to Longbranch and have Darrell at the hospital ’cause I had to have a C-section after you!’ She shook her head. ‘I coulda forgiven you most anything if you weren’t just so damn worthless.’

What with her depression setting in and the drama her granddaughter was creating, the old woman had totally forgotten her deadline. If she’d looked at her watch she might have realized it was time to start shooting people.

‘I ain’t worthless, Mama—’ Earl started, looking up at his mother, but Chandra interrupted.

‘Excuse me!’ she all but shouted. ‘I’m having a baby here! Would someone do something!’

Marge ran to her daughter’s side. ‘Are you for real this time?’ she whispered in Chandra’s ear.

‘Yes!’ Chandra hissed back.

Marge turned toward Jean, who was watching the scene. She nodded her head and Jean stood up and walked over to Chandra. ‘The real thing?’ she asked, speaking softly.

‘Oh, yeah!’ Chandra said and tried to breathe like she’d seen women do on TV.

Jean showed her how to do it correctly, then asked, ‘How close are they?’

‘Like all the time! It ain’t stopping!’ Chandra said.

Jean turned to Marge. ‘We need to get her in the bed—’

‘No!’ Marge whispered. ‘The only way to get my brother out of here is if he thinks he’s gonna witness childbirth. Blanton men don’t hold with that. So let’s say she’s too close and the men oughta leave.’

‘No!’ Chandra said. ‘Not the men! Then he’ll have a gun – ooooooooo – ha ha ha – oooooooo – on my baby’s daddy and I can’t— Oh, shit!’

Marge stood up. ‘Earl, unless you wanna see your niece give birth, I think you oughta step outside.’

Earl looked up at his mother, panic on his face.

‘Oh, for gawd’s sake! You Blanton men and your stomachs.’ Eunice shook her head. ‘Go on, get out! Not like you’re doing any good here anyway!’

Earl ran for the door, making gagging noises as he went. Marge followed discreetly, looking for all the world like she was just making sure the door shut behind him. Then, without her mother seeing her, she locked it and walked casually back to her daughter.

‘Jean, you need some help?’ Holly asked.

‘Yeah, I’ve delivered a few babies,’ Jasmine said.

Marge gave Jean a negative sign, and Jean said, ‘No, but thanks, you guys. I think her mother and I have it.’

Marge helped Jean lay Chandra down on the floor. The women sitting on the sofa and the love seat threw pillows in their general direction, which Jean used to cradle not only Chandra’s head but her lower anatomy as well.

Quietly to Marge, Jean asked, ‘What’s your plan?’

‘Well, I’ve still got my gun. I think maybe I’ll just have to shoot Mama.’

A
loud explosion rocked the boys nearly off their feet. A fireball lit up the sky in the opposite direction from where they were headed.

‘That’s gotta be houses going up!’ Johnny Mac said with alarm.

Matt nodded his head. ‘Yeah, but it’s not ours. I mean, not my house or your aunt’s. It’s too far away. Gotta be down the hill somewhere.’

‘Then we should go that way!’ Johnny Mac said.

‘Yeah, I guess. But I coulda sworn it was that way,’ Matt said, pointing behind them.

‘We gotta do something, or else Cody—’ Johnny Mac started.

‘Yeah, I know, I know,’ Matt interrupted. ‘Just don’t say it.’

Both boys stared at Cody’s unconscious body for a few moments, then at the dog which, when you thought about it, was the reason they were stuck in this mess in the first place.