Hot Enough to Kill (25 page)

I felt a not-so-gentle stab of fear. Why wasn't Jerry here, really? And furthermore, where was he? Something wasn't right. Not right at all. Maybe Amy took him to his own place, the location of which was not on my mother's list of knowns, or mine for that matter, although I knew he lived in Bowman City. We didn't send cards and letters to each other, just talked on the phone. I hopped back in the car, relayed the obvious and grabbed my cell phone. I punched in Jerry's number and waited. After four rings, the message machine picked up. A little shiver ran up my back at the sound of his voice, my usual involuntary reaction to that deep Texas drawl. His message was brief, but when the tone sounded, I hung up. What was I going to say anyway?

"Why'd you hang up?" Lucille asked, clicking her nails on the armrest.

"Well, I don't know. What did you want me to do, say 'Sorry you decided to run off with your ex-wife. Call when you have time?'"

"You don't know the situation. Assuming the worst isn't going to help. Regardless of what's going on with Amy, we need to talk to him if it's at all possible."

"Fine." I punched redial and waited for the tone. "Jerry, this is Jolene." I tried to sound real cheery, like I wasn't worried sick or sickly jealous, which of course I was. "If you get this message, please give me a call on my cell phone." I gave him the number, said I hoped he was feeling better and hung up before I blathered on about things that did not need to be said.

"I suppose we should drive on out to his house, just to be sure," Lucille said. "Do you think you can find it? I don't know my way around Bowman City very well."

Aside from the obvious telephone book source, I was fully confident that I could ascertain directions to Jerry's house at the Bowman City DQ--I have a way with folks, you know--but I didn't think that would do much good. I had the distinct feeling that even after I found his house, I still wouldn't find Jerry Don Parker.

I rustled around in my billfold until I found Jerry's card. I grabbed my cell phone again and punched in the number for the sheriff's department. "I'm going to try Pam Marshall. Maybe she knows what's going on."

Lucille nodded. "That's a good idea, Jolene. Real good. You be sure and tell her we're out and about after running off from her deputies while you're at it."

Good point. I started to hang up, but I really had to know that Jerry was okay. When the phone answered, I asked a lady, who sounded like she didn't much like her job, if I could speak to Deputy Marshall. The answer came quick and sharp. No, I couldn't speak to Deputy Marshall because she was not on duty. And no, I couldn't talk to Deputy Bob either. I'd almost called him Stalker Bob, but managed to admit I couldn't remember his actual last name. The lady on the phone remembered just fine and curtly informed me that Deputy Travers was on a call and wouldn't be available for quite a while and, well, just exactly who was I and what did I want anyway?

Before I could think of Plan C, Acting Sheriff Leroy Harper came on the line. "Jolene, is that you? Where are you?"

"Hi, Leroy," I said with a very heavy sigh.

He seemed not to notice my displeasure and continued on in a highly enthusiastic voice. "We've been looking everywhere for you and your mother. You okay?"

First, I wondered why he didn't sound his usual hateful self, and secondly, why wasn't he still out at Dewayne's place? That couldn't be over with this soon. My only hope was that Deputy Bob had taken over in Kickapoo and things were being handled correctly. One could always hope. "We're fine, Leroy."

"Where are you?" he repeated.

I did not answer the "where" part specifically, but explained that we had gone to visit Jerry in the hospital, although we had hit a little snag. "So where is he, Leroy?"

"Now, Jolene, if he's left the hospital, there's no telling where he's gone off to. I didn't go get him or anything." He paused and I could almost hear his brain clicking away at his thoughts. "Have you been over to his house?"

"No, but I called there and no one answered."

"Hmmm," Leroy said, mulling over what I'd said. "Well, maybe he's there at the house and just not answering the phone. Couldn't blame him for that."

No, I couldn't, but I also couldn't imagine him being there, hearing my message and not calling me back. Unless of course sweet Amy was screening calls. "I thought about going over there, but I don't really see the point," I said, although the point had just come to me clear as a blonde bell.

"That's a great idea!" Leroy said. "Heck, I'll even meet you there just to be sure everything's okay. It's real important that you and your mother are kept safe and sound. That's my job, you know, taking care of you two."

Thrown off balance by his abrupt change in demeanor, I didn't really know what to say. He sounded friendly and pretty darned sincere and that scared the living daylights out of me. "Mother and I are just fine, Leroy. No need to worry about us."

"Glad you're fine, but you sure did make a good point about checking out Jerry's house. The more I think about it, the more I'm sure we ought to go over there and see what's going on. But he's gonna be madder than an old wet hen if I show up and you're not with me."

I frowned. Something was very fishy--very. "So you know for sure he's at the house?"

"Well, I reckon that's where I'd go if I went home from the hospital. I'd go to my house, wouldn't you?" He did not give me a chance to answer, just rattled off directions to Jerry's house and signed off with a hearty "see you there in fifteen minutes."

I hung up the phone and looked at Mother. "Is Leroy a drinker?"

Lucille stared out the window at Amy's fancy red brick house, pursing her lips this way and that. "Leroy's an idiot. I don't know the particulars. What's he trying to pull now?"

"I don't know for sure, but something. He was extremely nice to me on the phone, eager to help."

"Nice, you say. Eager to help." Lucille picked at a curl of Frivolous Fawn, her eyes fixed on the road. "Well, then, I'd have to agree that something's wrong. He's been nothing but trouble throughout this whole thing, and now he's being extra nice? Has to be a reason."

"Maybe he's just trying to win me over so he can arrest me or something because of Dewayne."

Lucille continued to stare out the window and it wasn't likely she was making a list of the shrubs in the flowerbed. "That doesn't feel right," she said. "You had nothing to do with that and even he knows it. No, it's something else."

"I'm listening."

"Well, I don't have all the answers, Jolene. I'm just trying to figure this out same as you are." She rubbed her bandaged arm. "It seems to me, we're going to have to go to Jerry Don's place and see what Leroy's up to."

"Oh, I don't think so. Just because he's acting nice now, doesn't mean he really is. A leopard does not change his spots within the span of two hours."

"He does if somebody tells him to," Lucille said, staring at nothing, but the wheels in her mind spinning at a ferocious pace. "We both know that when Leroy thinks for himself, stupid things result, like accusing you of having something to do with Dewayne's hanging. That's a stupid Leroy thing."

I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel and studied the deer on the leaded glass front doors. One of them was staring straight ahead, ears all perked, at full alert, trying to figure out what was going on. I could certainly relate. "Okay, I follow that much. Go on."

"I'm only making suppositions, of course, but if we go meet Leroy, it seems we might have a little chance of finding out what's really going on, depending on what he tries to do, and who's pulling his strings, and why."

This plan of my mother's had "sitting duck" written all over it and that wasn't one of my favorite games, particularly when it was highly likely gunfire would be involved. "You know, Mother, maybe we ought to limit your input to things like 'Everything's going to be just fine.' Or better yet, 'You just do what you think's best, Jolene.' Yes, I really liked that last one a lot."

Lucille huffed, but otherwise ignored my rant. "It seems pretty clear to me that something has changed since we left Kickapoo, something that made a new man out of Leroy."

She was right, I just didn't want to face the nasty extrapolations that naturally came with the revelation. Leroy had been determined jerk, just looking to cause me trouble. If he hadn't been right beside me when the bullet hit the brick, I could probably find a reason to blame him for just about everything. Then again, if someone was giving him orders, then that meant there were at least two of them involved. Maybe they were taking turns at the targets. And now Leroy was up at bat again.

I turned toward Mother. "What if he's one of the ones behind all this? It makes sense if you add Uncle Fletch into the equation. Leroy shoots BigJohn for Fletch and Fletch nails Jerry for Leroy. I was just the bonus round, I guess."

Lucille nodded. "It's possible, I suppose, although why bother shooting you?"

"Leroy hates me?" I offered, but not with enthusiasm. It was possible I'd asked too many questions or made too many stupid comments to a certain related reporter. That stopped me. "Kimberlee. I threw out all kinds of possibilities as to who killed BigJohn and why. Maybe I got one right."

Lucille went from nodding right along to shaking her head in a highly negative way. "Oh, my, this is bad."

Yes, it was. And sitting here in Amy's driveway chatting wasn't really helping matters. "So do you want to go through Amarillo or cut over to Albuquerque and then head north? It's quicker to go up through Clayton."

"We're not going to Colorado, Jolene. We have to go to Jerry Don's house," she said. "We've got to get to the bottom of this one way or another. If Leroy's going to try to kill us, we should know pretty quickly, and you'll simply have to outrun him."

I did not see great promise in trying to outrun bullets. "Now that is one heckuva plan, Mother," I muttered, a nasty swarm of butterflies invading my stomach. "But wouldn't it be easier if I just called him back and asked him where he planned to kill us so we could avoid that street?"

"Don't be sarcastic, Jolene, it's unbecoming. Now, hurry up, I'd like to get to Jerry Don's house before Leroy does."

I made the loop around Amy Parker's fancy circular driveway, pulled out onto the highway and headed toward Bowman City. I saw no particular need to hurry, and this apparently did not sit well with my mother.

"You better get a move on it, Jolene, or Leroy's going to beat us there." She craned her neck over and looked at the speedometer. "How fast does this thing go, anyway?"

I accelerated just enough to break the speed limit and shrugged. "I've never had it over about eighty, so I don't really know."

"Hmmm," Mother said, shaking her head again. "My Buick had a governor on it. Just plain quit at a hundred. Hope yours doesn't have one of those things."

I did not ask my mother how she knew her car "just plain quit" at one hundred miles per hour nor did I ask her to elaborate on the past tense she so deftly used. The answers were obvious and I didn't need to dwell on the visual of my mother flying her Buick down the highway at 110 miles per hour. I also did not put the pedal to the metal to see if my own vehicle was equipped with auto-kill, figuring that was something I preferred not to know.

Following Leroy's directions, we wound up near the edge of town a small white house with forest green trim. Not even a distant relative to the upscale place Amy lived in, but neat with a big yard. He'd chosen it for the kids, no doubt.

A maroon sedan pulled up and parked in the street a few houses down, but there weren't any other suspicious-looking vehicles cruising the neighborhood--if you didn't count the blue Tahoe.

My stomach growled, reminding me that I hadn't eaten, being preoccupied with various other issues. I also hadn't realized how late it had gotten. It was getting dark quickly, and when I looked at the clock on the dash, I knew why. Eight fifteen didn't allow for much time to use the sunlight. The night closing in didn't do anything to ease my worries, but it did pretty much guarantee no one was in Jerry's house. All the curtains in the house were closed and I couldn't see a flicker of light or any signs of movement inside. "So what now?" I said to Lucille.

"Well," Lucille said, glancing around. "I'll bet you dollars to donuts that Jerry Don is not in that house nor has he been since he was shot in my breakfast nook, if indeed this is the right house."

"I agree."

"I've got a funny feeling," Lucille said, her eyes still scanning this way and that. "Maybe we ought to get on out of here."

I caught a flash of white in my rear view mirror. "Too late. Leroy's here."

Lucille eyed the patrol car moving steadily toward us. "Turn around and head toward him."

"You want me to talk to the moron or should I just stop in the middle of the road and be real still so he gets a good shot?"

Lucille frowned. "He's not going to shoot us right here in the middle of the neighborhood, Jolene." She paused and I swear I heard her mind say, "I don't think." "Besides, we don't have much choice now. This is our chance to see what he's got up his sleeve."

A 44 Mag would be my first guess, but then maybe he was a 38 kind of guy. Someone out there sure was. Nevertheless, I whipped the Tahoe around in the middle of the street, ever grateful for the short turning radius. Facing the sheriff's cruiser sent my stomach to fluttering again, but I crept toward Leroy anyway, determined to play the hand we'd dealt. "I'll try to smile real pretty so he won't shoot me right away, okay?"

"You do that, Jolene," Lucille said, clutching her purse with her good hand.

I stayed on the right side of the road and pulled to a stop beside the cruiser, which had also stopped, so my window was directly across from Leroy's. To give him a really good shot, I supposed. Trying not to shake, I rolled down my window, putting me less than two feet from the grinning acting sheriff. He was wiggling around in his seat like he had a nest of fire ants in his pants, and he was hugging the steering wheel like it was a life preserver. His obvious anxiety pulsed out in shivering waves, and I was getting more uneasy by the second. He was worried about something, so therefore I was worried--and just as nervous. Unfortunately, this condition tends to compel me to make either smartass comments or inane chatter. Feeling highly un-clever at the moment, I jumped right in with the inane. "Doesn't look like Jerry's home, Leroy," I said, shivering. "Guess we drove all the way over here for nothing."