Dark River Road (30 page)

An ugly red color swept up the sergeant’s face to his buzz-cut hairline. He had the same kind of complexion as Rainey, fair and freckled, but with his sandy hair shaved almost to the scalp where Rainey wore his long and unkempt. If Chantry didn’t know all Rainey’s relatives lived up in Missouri where he’d originally come from, he’d swear they were related.

“You think you’re a smart little fucker, don’t you,” the sergeant said softly. “Well, this time you ain’t got Dale Ledbetter to come bail you out of trouble. This time, old man Quinton’s the one in charge. And he wants that drug ring busted up. If we got to bust you to get it done, I don’t think he’ll have a problem with that.”

All of a sudden Chantry knew where the drugs came from. He knew who brought them in and how. Not that he had any proof. Just suspicion. And without proof to back it up, he was liable to end up in more trouble than he needed.

“I want a lawyer,” he said again, and thought
or my mama
. He needed her advice. She’d know what to do. What to say. And who to say it to.

Mama finally showed up late that afternoon. Dempsey brought her. Rainey was at the hospital with Rafe, who’d suffered injuries in the brawl, they said. No one mentioned that Chantry was involved, and he figured if Rafe didn’t want it known, he was willing to keep quiet. He just knew he’d have to watch his back. Not much different than before.

Dempsey waited in the hall outside, and he didn’t look upset so maybe Tansy was okay. If she wasn’t, he’d be with her and not here. That made him feel a little better, and he focused on his mother, who stared at him with eyes so angry they were a dark, stormy blue.

“I have no idea what my son was doing out there at that horrible place, Sergeant,” she was saying, “but I assure you he will never go back.”

“Miz Lassiter, I know you’re a good woman. You taught my nieces over there at Cane Creek, and they always spoke highly of you. But you’ve got a blind spot when it comes to your own boy. He’s in trouble, and he’s not making it any easier on himself. Get him to talk to us. Tell us what we want to know and maybe he won’t spend a few years in the reformatory. Otherwise
 . . .
”

Mama went pale, and Chantry glared at the sergeant. “He can’t do that, Mama. He’s just bluffing. He wants me to tell him stuff I don’t know. I had a beer, that’s all. One beer.”

“Be quiet, Chantry.” Mama sounded upset. He shut up.

Sergeant Gordon made a good case against Chantry, but Mama wasn’t stupid either. She finally looked at him when he paused to take a breath and said quietly, “Was my son given any kind of test to determine his alcohol level, Sergeant?”

Gordon had to allow that he hadn’t been, nor had he been seen with alcoholic beverages in his possession. No drugs, no alcohol, no resisting arrest, just in the wrong place at the wrong time if he didn’t count the fight in the police van. And that could be construed as self-defense if a good lawyer got up before the judge, Mama pointed out, and the sergeant had to agree.

“Then I would appreciate your releasing him into my custody for the present,” Mama said, and added, “We will return for any court hearing scheduled, of course.”

The tips of the sergeant’s ears had gone fiery red. His eyes looked red-rimmed as an angry bull’s. “You understand that I’ll make a full report to Mr. Quinton’s office, Miz Lassiter?”

“I certainly hope so, Sergeant. This is a grave matter, and anything Chantry can do to aid you in arresting the men responsible for bringing drugs into our county will be done. However, he has told you he knows nothing, and will undergo any type of drug testing you require to prove his innocence. If you wish, I will hire an attorney, but I think we both know that is unnecessary.”

After a minute, the sergeant got up and left the room, and shortly thereafter, Chantry was free of the cuffs and walking out with Mama and Dempsey. Nothing was said, not even on the ride home, and only when Dempsey stopped his truck at the end of their driveway did Chantry ask about Tansy.

Dempsey looked at him. “Came home real late last night. Or early this mornin’, I guess you could say. You might want to give her a call in a little while. She seems mighty anxious to talk to you.”

He wanted to call, but Mama wouldn’t let him near the phone, wouldn’t let him leave his room. He’d never seen her quite this angry at him. She was so angry, she didn’t say hardly a word other than that he was on restriction until she decided he could be trusted again, which may well be never. Rainey was gone, still at the hospital with Rafe, he guessed, and he knew Mama worried about what he’d say and do when he came home. Chantry figured he couldn’t say too much since his sons had been there, too. Not that that’d stop him.

Well after dark, she finally brought him a dinner tray to eat at his desk. His stomach rolled in anticipation, but he stood awkwardly and waited until she set it down.

Mikey stood in the doorway, eyes wide and anxious. His braces squeaked and his thick shoes made a thumping sound as he struggled into the room.

“Don’t you love Chantry anymore, Mama?”

Mama went very still. Her hands hovered over the tray like small pale birds for a moment, then she turned around. “Of course I do, Mikey.”

“Then why don’t you understand?”

A frown settled on Mama’s brow, and Chantry signaled to Mikey to hush. He didn’t. He lurched forward a few steps in that crab-like gait the braces allowed, and stood right between them in the middle of the room. Mama’s mouth went tight.

“Understand what, Mikey? Chantry’s actions have been abominable. He has broken my trust and does not even seem to care that he’s caused a great deal of harm not only to himself, but to others.” She looked over at Chantry, eyes dark with some kind of emotion he didn’t recognize. “I do not know him anymore. I do know I don’t like this boy he has become.”

Chantry sucked in a sharp breath that seemed to freeze his lungs. She’d never said anything like that to him. Ever.

“That’s ‘cause he lost his shark, Mama,” Mikey said, and even though Chantry heard him and knew what he meant, he couldn’t say anything, couldn’t move.

Mama sounded impatient. “Whatever are you talking about, Mikey?”

“His shark. You know. His reason to be here. Ever’body’s got to have a reason to be here. You told me that sometimes you think me’n Chantry are the reason God wanted you here. Well, I got a shark. Now Chantry needs his shark back.”

“His shark? I don’t know
 . . .
what
 . . .
I do not understand.”

Chantry felt stupid and childish, and shot Mikey a dark look that should have shut him up but didn’t. He didn’t want to think about sharks and he didn’t want to think about Shadow. And he didn’t want to hear this. He wished he could just sink through the floorboards to the dirt under the house and disappear. But all he could do was stand there and listen.

“In the hospital I thought maybe I wasn’t gonna wake up after the op’ration, but Chantry said I had to if I wanted to see the sharks for real. So I did. I woke up and he bought me a shark, and he said that one day he’ll take me to see real sharks. In the ocean, maybe. Well, Shadow was his shark and now he doesn’t have him anymore. He needs a shark, Mama.”

Silence settled in the room, so soft and thick it was like lying under a down quilt on a cold winter night. He stared down at the floor. It seemed like forever before Mama said anything.

Then she just said, “Eat your dinner before it gets cold, Chantry.”

Whatever Mama said to Rainey
must have been pretty persuasive, because though he took to giving Chantry really ugly looks, he never said anything about Rafe or the fight or how Chantry came to be out at the Hideaway. The police gave Chantry a drug test like Mama had said they could, and when he came out clean they didn’t charge him with drugs, just misdemeanors. When he finally went to court in early January, he got a fine and six months’ probation.

Mama would have made a good lawyer, Chantry thought whenever he remembered how she’d stood up to Sergeant Gordon. She knew how to keep cool in a fight.

Because she was still upset with him, he never said anything to her about who he thought might be bringing drugs into Quinton County, and he didn’t know who else to tell. It was too big a risk. Being right could get him in just as much trouble as being wrong, and he had more on his plate right now than he liked to think about.

A few nights after he was put on probation, Tansy showed up at his window. It was cold and bitter outside, but she scratched at his window screen and woke him up and motioned for him to raise the window. He glanced at Mikey, who slept peacefully curled up in a little ball like a big puppy, then eased open the sash and stared at her sleepily.

“What are you doing out there, girl?”

“Came to see you.” She was shivering, and after a moment’s hesitation, he motioned her to come in. She shook her head. “That’d be all you’d need, to get me caught in your bed. No, I
 . . .
I just wanted to
 . . .
to say thanks. You took the rap while the rest of us got off.”

It was the first time they’d gotten to talk without Mama standing over them, or Dempsey or somebody at school watching like hawks. He shrugged. “If you’re talking about the Hideaway, I’m glad you got out of there. It would have only made it all worse.”

“I know why you hit Beau,” she said, and he grimaced.

“I’d kinda hoped you hadn’t heard him.”

“I didn’t. Chris told me. He
 . . .
he said you’re a really good friend to me.”

He didn’t say anything to that. He really wasn’t sure how he felt about Chris Quinton right now. He’d kept him from getting stabbed with a beer bottle, but it wasn’t easy to let go of their past either. They still avoided each other, and he liked it that way. Being on probation had its small advantages since he hadn’t run into him anywhere except church.

“I hope you’re stayin’ away from him,” he said roughly, and when she didn’t answer, he groaned. “Dammit, Tansy.”

She pressed her palm against the window screen. “Chantry
 . . .
whatever happens, I want you to know that I’ll always remember you.”

A sharp bolt of fear shot through him. He stared at her. “Tansy, what the hell are you talking about? What can happen?”

“Nothing. Everything.” Her laugh sounded hollow. “There’s so much I haven’t told you. I miss our talks. It just all got so twisted somehow, what I was feeling inside and everything. It’s like being in a tunnel sometimes, where it’s all dark and empty and you think you’re never gonna get to the end. And then finally, you see light ahead and you start running—you think it’s the end of the tunnel but it’s only another tunnel just beginning.”

Dim light from a sickle moon illuminated the porch and her face, and even though she wore a thick coat she couldn’t seem to stop shivering. He got a terrible feeling deep in his belly.

“Jesus, Tansy
 . . .
you
 . . .
you’re not on drugs or anything are you?”

For a moment she looked surprised; then she laughed, a sharp sound. “Sometimes you’re thick as a post, Chantry Callahan. No, I’m not on drugs. And so you’ll know, I didn’t know they sold drugs out there. I mean, I’d heard the rumors about stuff going on, but sometimes that’s all they are, is rumors. Lies. Like so much around here.” She pulled her coat more tightly around her. “You just wouldn’t believe how thick the lies can get, like dead leaves piling up so high you can’t see over them. And sometimes I think,
All it would take is one lit match to set fire to all those lies.
If that happened, there’d be a bonfire seen all the way to Memphis.”

“What the hell are you talking about now?”

She blew out a sigh. “I hope you never find out, Chantry. I swear to God, I do. Just do me a favor, okay?”

“Sure.”

A smile curved her mouth, and she pressed her face close to the screen. “I love that about you, Chantry. You never ask. You just have faith in me. Put your hand against mine, will you?” Slowly, he lifted his palm and pressed it against the screen where she held hers, and he felt the warmth of her skin through the mesh. Her voice sounded thick, low. “You once said I was like a rainbow, remember? Well, rainbows are promises, too. Will you remember that?”