Once Upon a Cowboy (24 page)

Jess took a deep breath as she turned her rental car into the parking lot of the Smugglers’ Gully Police Department the next morning. On her way from the airport, she’d stopped at Walmart to buy a change of clothes, and she’d put them on in a rest area stall, then picked the rest of the hay from her hair.

She parked carefully, trying to swallow as her freezing hands shook on the wheel.
It was ninety degrees in the shade here in South Carolina, but she felt like she needed a fleece. All the way here, she’d rehearsed what she would say, and at the rest area, she’d looked up attorneys in the phone book, writing three down on the little pad in her purse in case she needed to call one from a cell.

It was a huge risk to take, and she knew it, but she also knew that if she didn’t
come clean, Billy’s crime was going to eat at her for the rest of her life. Yes, Mack might have come out of the incident with only a shoulder injury, but that didn’t excuse her silence for all this time. She needed to tell the police what she knew, and then she needed to accept whatever punishment went with that.

After that, she’d figure out how to deal with Roxie and Luanne.

If nothing else,
her disastrous conversation with Cole last night had clarified one thing: she
couldn’t
move forward—not with this hanging in her background. The guilt of it had been eating at her for years, and until she dealt with it, she was never going to feel free to live her life—or share it with anyone else.

She took a deep breath and stepped out of the car, closing the door behind her as she placed her
purse carefully on her shoulder. The oppressive heat made it feel like she was walking through thick soup as she made her way to the glass door, but she forced herself to put one foot in front of the other until she got there.

She walked into the tiny lobby, which was painted a muted green color that reminded her of the moss out behind her old trailer. There were three metal chairs pushed against
the wall, and a bulletproof reception window with a speaker in it.

“Can I help you?” A uniformed woman raised her eyebrows from behind the glass. Jess was surprised to realize she didn’t recognize her. Somehow she’d figured she’d recognize everyone, like nothing had changed in the thirteen years she’d been gone.

“Yes.” She blew out a breath. “I have information—on a crime.”

The eyebrows went
higher. “Have a seat. Someone will be right with you.”

One minute later, the door opened and an officer whose face actually looked familiar motioned her through, then waved her into a seat beside his metal desk. He reached out a hand. “Victor Carlyle. You graduated with my son Tyler. Or—well, you were in the same class, right?”

Right. She hadn’t graduated. He’d probably remembered that just
one beat too late. She remembered Tyler as one of the smart kids, one of the ones who lived closer to Charleston, one of the ones whose parents probably made Sunday dinner and gave him an allowance.

She put her hand in his for a brief second, then pulled back.

“You want a coffee or anything?” His eyes were concerned as they flipped from Jess’s shaky hands to her eyes.

“No, thank you.”

“Okay.”
He sat down behind his desk and pulled out a sheet of blank paper. “How about you tell me why you’re here.”

Jess took another deep breath, tried to find the words she’d practiced on the flight, but they wouldn’t come. Instead, in the face of Victor’s concerned expression, something happened. Maybe it was the fact that she was back here in Smugglers’ Gully breathing the dank air and wishing to
be anywhere
but
here. Maybe it was the fact that she’d finally dared walk into the police station after all these years.

Maybe it was the fact that her admission to Cole had stripped her so bare last night that she had no defenses left.

She had no idea.

But instead of the phrases she’d rehearsed, different words flew out of her mouth. She talked about Mack, and seeing him crumple, and not telling
what she knew. And Victor nodded, and his pen moved on a yellow pad, and Jess found the noise of it somehow comforting.

“What happened after you left the convenience store?” He stopped his pen, and Jess swallowed.

“I’m not sure that’s—relevant,” she tried. “That’s all I know about the night he shot Mack.” She closed her eyes tightly, trying not to see the gun, the flash, the crumpling.

“I know
Billy, and I have a feeling there might be more to the story.” Victor put down his pen. “We can help you, if you let us.”

She shook her head, feeling tears spring up behind her eyes. No. This wasn’t why she was here. She just wanted to confess her role in Mack’s shooting. Wanted to confess that she’d known Billy did it. Wanted to confess that she’d never, ever told anyone. Wanted the officer
to show her a cell and take her keys and purse. Wanted to sit quietly and stop remembering.

“Billy’s incarcerated, hon.” He leaned down to try to look into her eyes. “He’s away for a long, long time. He can’t hurt you.”

“He—he is?” Jess’s eyes widened as she looked up.

Victor nodded, but didn’t elaborate.

“For—this? For Mack?”

“This, and a pretty long list of other things. You weren’t the
first woman he hurt, and you definitely weren’t the last.”

“How—”
How did he know?

“We got an anonymous tip about a month after the shooting.” He paused. “I think we both know who it probably came from.”

Grampy.
Her hand flew to her mouth.

“My theory is he waited until he knew you were safe, out of Billy’s reach, and then he called.”

“But if Billy’d ever found out—”

“Billy had a lot of enemies,
Jess. They were more than happy to see him get put away. We had a lot of help with this one.”

“Oh God.”

Victor reached across the desk. “Billy needed to be behind bars. And until he’s approximately 153 years old, that’s where he’ll be.”

Jess felt her shoulders slowly deflate. The man was never going to be able to hurt anyone again. Was never going to be able to hurt
her
again.

“If you ever
decide you
do
want to talk about what he did to you, I’m right here—or you can talk to a female officer, if you prefer.”

“I never said—”

“I know.” Victor nodded. “It’s up to you, Jess. He’s put away. You’re safe from him.”

“I—I can’t believe there were others.” Jess clutched her stomach. If she’d spoken up sooner, would somebody have been saved?

“All before you, except for one that he went
back to after you left town.”

“So, what happens now?”

Victor sat back. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

“I mean—do you arrest me?”

“Arrest you? No, Jess. No. You were a victim. If you’d told us back then, I’m not confident we could have kept you safe. I hate that it’s true, and I hate even more that you knew that. I’m just happy you came back so I could be the one to tell you we got him.”

“So
I can—go? Just go?”

He stood up. “Yeah. You can go.” He motioned toward the door as she stood up, then walked behind her. “I’m glad you came in. It’s good to see that you’re—okay.” He looked at her closely as they reached the door. “
Are
you okay?”

Jess nodded, but pain crossed her midsection when she thought back to Cole’s stony silence last night. She had no idea what was going to happen once
she finished here in Smugglers’ Gully, and the thought scared her more than she’d imagined it would.

“I’m getting there,” she finally answered.

“I wish your grandfather could see you now.”

“Yeah,” she whispered. “Me, too. Thanks, Victor.”

As she stepped back out into the sunlight, the damp heat pressed on her shoulders, but she realized she felt lighter than she had in a long time.

Billy
was in jail. In
jail
.

She was safe from him. Safe forever from him.

Now she just needed to deal with Roxie and Luanne.

Hours later, Jess turned her rental car into Breezy Meadow, feeling like it was suddenly thirteen years ago—fifteen—twenty. The same weeds grew up around the metal sign, the paint was still peeling off the
B
and the
M,
the same old rocking chair was sitting on the same decrepit porch on the first trailer on the right. The late afternoon sun did nothing to gentle the sight.

She turned
down the gravel driveway toward the back row of trailers, her pulse racing, her hands turning white on the steering wheel. When she made the final turn and saw the trailer she’d grown up in, her foot found the brake pedal.

Could she really pull up in that weed-choked yard? Could she knock on that mustard-yellow door? Could she do
any
of this?

She sat there for what felt like twenty minutes,
knowing very well how many eyes were peering out of the other trailers wondering where this red car had come from, wondering who the stranger was.

But no one came out. She hadn’t expected them to. Strangers in shiny cars were never a good thing in a place like this. They were social workers, they were court-appointed whoevers, they were dealers. Best thing was to hide behind your flimsy curtains
in your tin box and wait for them to leave.

Finally she took her foot off the brake and let the car roll slowly toward number 37. She had to do this. She’d survived the police station. It had taken her hours to gather up enough courage to drive across town to the trailer park. But she could do this. She could survive Roxie and Luanne.

As she watched the trailer, though, her confidence wavered.
Last night she’d taken the biggest chance of her life, telling Cole the things she’d told him. And it had worked out exactly as she had always feared. She’d scared the bejeezus right out of him, and now he’d never, ever look at her the same way again.

If
he ever looked at her at all.

She’d taken that risk, and it had bitten back hard, but the past few days had brought her a strange sort of clarity,
an odd sense of peace amidst the chaos and pain—and it had strengthened her. Surrounded by the Whisper Creek family, living for just a week in a place so far from anything she knew, Jess had felt a comfort she’d never found anywhere else.

And even though Cole had been blown away by her revelations—even though he might never be able to think of her as anything
but
damaged goods—seeing herself
through his eyes had given her a strength she hadn’t even known she had. It had given her the power to realize she
could
choose her life. She could move forward, leave this behind, and stop letting it have power over her.

She could stop being afraid of it sneaking up to pull the rug out from under her carefully constructed lie.

But first she had to face it. She had to face
them
.

So last night
on that red-eye flight, she’d made decisions. She was sick of her past defining her future. She was sick of hiding Star Smith under thirteen years of lies. She was sick of blaming herself for the things that had been done to her. She was sick of apologizing and covering things up and hiding.

Yes, she was
dead
sick of hiding.

Jess pulled up in front of the trailer and stepped out of the car before
she could lose her nerve. Then she leaned back in for the pepper spray she’d piled on top of her jeans and tee shirts at Walmart. She was mad and she was committed, but she wasn’t stupid. She had no idea who might be behind that door these days.

With leaden legs, she made her way up to the tiny porch, stepping over a bin of Old Milwaukee cans. A white plastic chair with three legs sat propped
against the wall of the trailer, and she paused for a strange moment, wondering how anyone sat in it without falling right off the rickety little porch.

She faced the door, took a deep breath, and knocked.

First there was silence. Then she heard shuffling steps come toward the door.

“Who is it?” The voice was creaky, smoke stained, older than her nightmares.

“It’s Je—” She took a breath, lifted
her chin, squared her shoulders. “It’s Star.”

The inside door whipped open, and behind the screen stood Roxie, dressed in the same robe Jess remembered from high school. Her bloodshot eyes skated up and down Jess’s body while her mouth worked its way into a fake smile. “Well, if it ain’t you.” She called over her shoulder. “Luanne! Get out here! You’ll never believe who’s here.”

Jess waited
uneasily while Luanne came out from somewhere down the hall. Behind Roxie, the trailer looked like time had stood still. The same yellow glass ashtray sat on the Formica table, still overflowing with butts. The same cuckoo clock was still a little off-kilter on the wall, and probably still hadn’t been wound since Jess was ten.

The same Luanne came to the door
. Only not really the same at all.

Jess almost stepped backward in shock when she saw her aunt. Instead of the jet-black hair and coral lipstick she’d always sported, her hair had gone silvery, sparse. Where her body had always carried about twenty extra pounds, it had now gone rail thin under her T-shirt and leggings. Her mouth looked pinched and old, especially when she worked her features around to mimic Roxie’s version of a smile.

“Well, well, well. Who’d believe it?”

“You want to come in?” Roxie raised one perfectly plucked eyebrow.

“No, thank you.”

Roxie crossed her arms and looked through the screen, left and right at the other trailers. “Not sure this is the best place to talk, if you know what I mean. Why don’t you come in?”

“I don’t have a lot to say, so it’ll be fine.” Jess was never, ever going to cross that
threshold again, certainly not by choice. She gathered her words, anxious to be gone, but also focused on being clear enough that she’d never have to come back here again.

Luanne’s eyes narrowed. “Assume you’re here to talk about the money?”

“I am.”

Jess didn’t miss the superior look that passed between the two of them.

“Okay.” Roxie lifted her chin. “We’re listening. You thought about what
we said?”

“I have.”

“So you’re going to share your little windfall, then? So we don’t have to—take drastic measures?” Again with the eyebrow. Jess fought the urge to roll her eyes.

“I’m not afraid of your—
drastic measures,
Roxie.”

“You don’t say?” Roxie turned toward Luanne, a sneer overtaking the benign smile. “She’s not afraid, Luanne.”

“She says that now. We’ll see what she says from a
ten-by-ten cell. Maybe then she’ll be afraid, eh?” Luanne let out one of her gravelly laughs, then had to cover her mouth while she coughed.

“I’ve already been to the police. And I know now that Billy’s going to spend the rest of his life behind bars. Your threats don’t hold water, I’m afraid.”

Jess saw her mother’s shoulders fall, but at the same time, her bony chin hiked up in defiance. “They
weren’t threats. They were encouragement. We just—wanted you back here. Right, Luanne?”

“Sure.” Luanne shook her head and rolled her eyes.

Jess took a deep breath. “The money’s gone, Roxie. Don’t bother chasing me for it.”

Roxie whipped the door open, came at Jess like she had a thousand times before. It took everything in Jess’s power not to back up, not to wince. She thumbed the trigger of
the pepper spray, ready to use it if she needed to.

“What do you mean, it’s gone?”

“It’s gone. I gave it away.”

“You
what
?” Jess braced for a slap, watched Roxie’s hand twitch at her side.

Let her try, Jess thought. Let her pull that hand up and send it toward her face. Oh, just let her. This time Jess would slap back. She’d take all the rage she’d been holding inside for all these years,
and she’d let her have it.

Roxie seemed to feel Jess’s fury, seemed to sense a change in the landscape. She clenched her fist, took a deep breath, and looked like she was trying to gather herself. “You’re lying.”

“I’m not.”

“You so well off now that you can afford to throw money away? That it? And you’ve never thought to send any home to your poor mama and auntie? Huh?”

Jess shook her head.
“I just knew a place that could use it more than me. And definitely more than you.”

Luanne pushed the door open farther. “She’s lying. She just don’t want us to get our hands on the money. How much did he leave you, huh?”

Jess reached into her purse and pulled out a piece of paper with a business name and address carefully blacked out. She handed it to Roxie. “I’m not telling you where it went,
or how much he left, because it’s not your concern. But this is the receipt so you know it’s gone. The—charity—I donated it to is a good place with good people who do good things. It was the right thing to do.”

“You threw away twenty-five thousand dollars? Are you
stupid
? I didn’t raise you like this.”

There was a long pause while Jess tried to come up with a response, and then a voice from
behind her almost made her fall backwards.

“Far as I can see, you didn’t raise her at all.”

The next thirty seconds would be burned into Jess’s memory forever, she knew. As her own head whipped around to see Cole standing at the bottom of the steps, Roxie and Luanne just about fell out the door as they clambered to see where the deep, resonant voice had come from.

Before Jess could close her
gaping mouth, Cole smiled. “Hey, cowgirl.”

He stepped over an overflowing recycle bin and onto the small porch beside her, putting his arm around her back and settling her firmly against his side. He smiled down at her, squeezing her gently, then turned his gaze on her mother.

“You must be Roxie.”

Roxie reached out her hand, fluttered her eyelashes, and worked up one of her best smiles. “I
am. And who would you be?”

“I’m Cole.” He looked at her hand, but didn’t lift his own. Hers fluttered to her side in defeat. “I’m a friend of your daughter’s, and I just wanted to stop by and let you know a couple of things.”

Jess could see the tightness around his mouth that belied his smile, but Roxie was too mesmerized by his eyes, his voice, to notice.

“If you ever,
ever
try to contact
Jess again, I will have the authorities on the phone within three seconds. And if you ever,
ever
threaten her again, I will come back here and contact every journalist and police officer in this county. And they will know what went on in this trailer for all those years. They will know—and you will pay for what you did.”

Roxie actually looked scared for a moment, but then her customary sneer
took over her face. “You talk big, honey, but it ain’t gonna happen. Ain’t nothing ever happened here that anybody would care about, anyway.”

Jess felt Cole’s body stiffen at her words, felt his hand tighten around her. And God, it felt good. It felt good to have him standing here on this porch with her. Felt good to have his arm around her, holding her close, holding her up.

“I care. I care
a hell of a lot.” His voice vibrated through her, and she gathered his strength as he held her. “And you’re delusional to think others wouldn’t. What you did is despicable, and criminal. And if Jess ever decides to contact the authorities, I will be right here by her side. As will my entire family, and that is a group you do
not
want to challenge.”

Luanne rolled her eyes. “Princess here wouldn’t
want her name dragged into the muck, anyway. So you can quit standing on our doorstep tossing empty threats around, you understand?”

Jess took a deep breath, feeling rage and courage combine into a boiling cauldron she needed to release.

“I would absolutely testify against you.” Her voice was quiet, but it was strong, and both Roxie and Luanne looked at her with new fear in their eyes. “I would
absolutely get up in a court of law and tell whoever was listening about all the things you did. I
will
do this, because it’s something I
should
have done a long, long time ago.”

“You wouldn’t.” Roxie’s voice shook, though her chin hiked higher.

Jess nodded. “I would. So I’d encourage you to withdraw your petition to contest the will. I really would.”

Roxie rolled her eyes, but Jess saw her
swallow hard. “Bullshit. They’d never believe you, anyway.”

“Oh, I think they would.” Jess paused, then put a hand on her shirt hem and lifted it. “They’d sure believe this. And I’m pretty sure this is all the proof they’d need to toss you into jail and throw away the key.”