Redemption (7 page)

It will?
Overton thought.
And why does she always put “by Autumn Harper”? She writes the entire damn paper.

“
Creed Rydell? Why’d Autumn include him?” Creed Rydell hadn’t stepped foot in Snow in over thirty years.
As if anyone will give that ornery son-of-a-bitch some sympathy
. Overton wondered if Creed, an habitual drunk and frequent resident of the drunk tank over in Pine, would inherit the properties.
Creed Rydell, a property owner? Maybe the world is ending next year after all.

He drove to Snow and parked in front of Lester’s garage. The lights were off, the doors shut. Overton checked his watch: 7:15. Lester opened at 6:30 sharp every morning.
Maybe his Land Cruiser’s belts dry-rotted overnight, too.

He flipped through the
Times
until he found its version of yesterday’s events, all of two inches on the fourth page of the second section:

“
We are?” Annie Mitch
ell
and Darcy
Riddle.
“Sorry y’all. City folks can’t spell for shit and they sure don’t check their facts very well.”

Overton looked up to see a white two-door Bronco enter the lot, its tires squealing.
Ramsey and his OJ truck.
He rolled down his window. “Lester’s late.” Overton squinted. “And you don’t look as if you’ve seen a bed in a while, Ramsey. Heat keep you up?”

Ramsey rubbed his eyes. “You could say that. A fire can be pretty hot.”

“
What fire?”

“
You didn’t hear the explosion?”

“
What explosion?”

“
At Lester’s place. Went up like a torch. Was there all night with a bucket brigade. I tried to call you, but ...”

I gotta find a way for folks to reach me at Callie’s.
“And Lester?”

“
Ain’t found him yet, but Wilkes thinks his truck was there.”

“
Get in.”
Bad things come in three’s. Very bad things.

“
Far as I can tell,” Bobby Wilkes of the Pine County Volunteer Fire Department said, “that ol’ boy blew himself sky-high. All it took was probably a propane leak and a match. We’re lucky the winds were light last night or we’d have lost a hundred acres or so.”

“
Lester did smoke like a chimney,” Ramsey said.

“
It was kinda like that night that church burned down,” Wilkes said. “What was it? The Mount Zion African Methodist or some other long-ass name like that.”

Same night J died,
Overton thought. There had been talk of a white supremacist conspiracy, and Sheriff Hughes hadn’t exactly snuffed that out. “Ain’t no Klan in
my
county, no sir,” he had told a Channel 38 news reporter, “but if this is Klan-related, and I think it is, then it came from far outside Pine County.”

Overton stood in front of the charred, smoking remains of Lester’s house, the stone foundation the only structure left standing. A few of the volunteers were cooking a breakfast of bacon and eggs in a pan on the foundation itself, a pot of coffee bubbling alongside.

Bacon, eggs, and coffee—breakfast at Lester’s without Lester. There’s something almost unmannerly and rude about that.

“
Any sign at all of Lester’s body?”

“
None,” Ramsey said.

“
Where were the tanks?”

“
Probably behind the house,” Wilkes said. “Darren found ‘em back in the woods about a hundred yards from here, flat as pancakes. Probably shot off like rockets, an’ anyone who saw ‘em woulda thought they were leftover fireworks. By the time we got here, the place was gone. Still a few hot spots, so watch your step.”

“
Like the foundation,” Ramsey said.

“
Ain’t that somethin’?” Wilkes said. “Foundation was still so hot we could boil water. We all got us a nice shave this mornin’.”

Overton walked around to the back, Ramsey trailing behind.

“
It was a helluva night,” Ramsey said. “After the water in the truck ran out, we had to use buckets, even bait buckets and a few toy buckets, to put the fire out. Had a line of a dozen men from Darwin’s Creek all the way here. I never been so tired.”

“
Why didn’t they just siphon up water into the truck from the creek?”

“
Too shallow. The hose sucked up too damn many rocks, and Wilkes didn’t want to damage—”

“
I know, I know.
His
truck.” Overton looked around. “Where’s Lester’s truck?”

“
You walked past it.” He pointed to a pile of molten metal. “We think that’s the engine block. And it looks like ol’ Lester was plannin’ on doin’ a whole lotta drinkin’ last night, too. You should see all the beer bottles we found with holes melted clear through.”

I hope to God he was drunk when it happened. He didn’t have a chance, but maybe he didn’t feel a thing
. “Have you called Calhoun yet?”

Ramsey stepped closer. “Do we need to?”

“
You know how to find a body in this mess?
I
don’t. And we better call Lester’s mama.”

“
Lester had a mama?”

Overton glared at him.

“
I mean,” Ramsey said, “is she from around here?”

“
She lives in some retirement community in Florida, number’s back at the garage next to the phone. Radio Powell then call Lester’s mama.”

Ramsey looked at the ground. “Wouldn’t
you
rather talk to his mama? You know her better than I do.”

I probably should.
“Yeah, I better. Get on the radio and get Powell down here.”

“
Will do.”

Overton looked up at the trees nearest the foundation and saw that the fire had burned straight up for the most part.
Could a bomb have done this?
He felt a chill then shook it away.
Damn, old man. Don’t scare yourself. Don’t forget that you’re the sheriff of the sleepiest county in Virginia.

“
Amazin’, ain’t it?” Wilkes said. “It looked like an honest-to-God pillar of fire, kinda like a flaming phone booth almost. We been lookin’ up trees around here all mornin’ to see if maybe Lester’s body—”

“
Autumn Harper been by?” Overton interrupted.

Wilkes smiled. “So that’s where you been. Don’t blame you, Sheriff. Don’t blame you a bit. She’s a pretty fine piece of ass.”

“
Has she been by?” Overton asked with a frown.

“
Yeah, for a little while early this mornin’, right before sunup, I think. Took some pictures of us workin’ and left right before you got here.”

Ramsey and I
should have passed her on the road if she was headed back to town. Why didn’t we?
He nodded and walked back to the Crown Victoria, Wilkes trailing behind.

“
Powell’s on his way,” Ramsey said. “He said we must be havin’ an epidemic or somethin’.”

Three die here in three days and it’s an epidemic.
“I want you to stay here and keep looking for Lester. Then catch a ride back to town with Powell. Radio me if you find anything, and I mean, anything.”

“
Where you goin’, Sheriff?” Wilkes asked with a smirk.

“
Gotta go call Lester’s mama.”
But first, I have to keep Autumn from getting herself killed at Annie’s house.

9

Three down, four to go.

Watch the sun rise. Praise the Lord for another glorious day. Lay back. Relax. Plan. Dream.

Many miles to go before sleeping again. Five hundred to be exact. One suitcase will be enough. Carry it on. Might be there for a few days. Room service better be good. Maybe a book to read? Or some reading material from Annie’s? Wonderful stuff. Yes. But mail Darcy’s diary to a future friend first. Yes. Future friends will definitely be necessary.

You can never be too careful about the future.

Mags won’t be hard to find. Addresses are current. Apartment on the tenth floor, office on the forty-fourth, and it’s a long way down from the top. Wonder what will go through her mind as she falls. What a view? It’s lonely at the bottom, too?

Must give her more time to think, so she’ll have to out of the office for a while. Yes. Thirty-four more floors to do some serious thinkin’.

And oh, how the mighty will fall.

10

Overton parked next to Autumn’s Escort in front of Annie’s wood-frame ranch located behind a forest of overgrown weeds, bushes, and kudzu. Ivy threatened to take over the left side of the house, two windows barely visible, and the bushes in front had grown nearly to the roof.
Annie’s little wilderness retreat.

He didn’t want to startle Autumn, so he honked the horn twice then called out her name. He listened and heard nothing but an occasional cicada warming up for another hot day. He turned on the siren briefly and shouted her name again. Still no reply. He got out and slammed the door, shouting her name once more over the hiss from the Crown Victoria’s air-conditioner.

He slipped through the bushes sideways to the front door and knocked. A moment later, Autumn opened the door. “Oh, hi Sheriff.”

“
Oh, hi Sheriff? Didn’t you hear—”

“
I heard you. You here to arrest me for breaking-and-entering?”

“
No, but I ought to. We were supposed to do this together.”

“
The door was open, and someone has already beat us to it. I think.”

“
Beat us to what?”

“
Well, I can’t tell.” She tugged at his sleeve. “Come on. I want to show you something.”

Overton followed Autumn through piles of trash, newspapers, and magazines where furniture should have been in the front two rooms down a hallway to a back room that was surprisingly clean. “
This,
” Autumn said, “is what I wanted to show you.”

“
An empty room?”

She blinked at him. “The rest of this house is a landfill, but not
this
room. Why? This room has been scoured and swept, not a speck of dust anywhere. Even the windows are spotless and don’t have newspaper covering them like all the others. And you smell that?”