Blanco County 04 - Guilt Trip (23 page)

Colby was wondering if his ulterior motives were obvious. “Think you’re pretty smart, don’t you?” George said. “But I been thinking the same thing all along. Any fool would know I wasn’t planning on going three days without food and water.”

“That’s what I figured. That you had it all worked out in your head.”

“Damn right I do. Sure as hell don’t need any help from you. I was just waiting for the right time, is all. Maybe after dark.”

Colby nodded. “Makes sense to me.”

“Don’t get a smart mouth.”

“No, I wasn’t.”

“Nothing I can’t stand more than a smart mouth.”

Rita Sue Metzger was watching a CMT biography of Dolly Parton—Lord, how did that woman tote those things around for all these years without ruining her back?—when her phone rang. She considered not answering it, but she had a peculiar feeling about this call, and she was right.

“Mama?” a small voice said on the other end.

“Stephie, is that you? Where in the world are you, hon?”

“Florida.”

Rita Sue could hear the sounds of traffic in the background. “With Lucas?” she asked.

“Not anymore.”

That wasn’t what Rita Sue wanted to hear. If the two of them had split up, that could only mean that something had gone wrong.

“Mama, I called the cops. They’re coming for me,” Stephanie wailed. “I have to tell them—I think Lucas killed Vance.”

Rita Sue sat up straight in her easy chair. “Is that what he said?”

“No, but I think…I think he’s lying.”

“What did he tell you?” Panic was welling up in Rita Sue’s chest. Everything was coming unraveled.

“That he went to Vance’s and found him by the barn. He said he was alive at first, but he died later, in Lucas’s car.”

Rita Sue’s heart went out to her daughter. The poor girl had fallen for Vance Scofield early on, after just a few dates. And later, when he’d revealed himself to be a dyed-in-the-wool son of a bitch, Stephanie still couldn’t see it. She couldn’t see that Lucas—an honorable young man who was getting his life together—was a much better choice. Rita Sue and Lucas had had long talks about the situation, and she had done her best to steer Stephanie in the right direction. Now Rita Sue wondered if she’d screwed Stephanie’s life up for good. Lucas’s, too. Maybe she’d given him bad advice. Maybe the cops would’ve believed him.

Rita Sue was ashamed of herself, especially when Stephanie said, “Mama, he said he came to see you. He said that you must’ve put Vance’s body in the water. Is that true?”

Rita Sue didn’t know what to say. So many of her intentions had started out good—and then gone straight to hell. Nothing had worked out the way she had intended.

“Mama?”

“Steph, baby, I only wanted what was best for you. That’s all I ever wanted.”

Stephanie was crying uncontrollably now. “So you did it? You put Vance in the river?”

Before Rita Sue could answer, she heard other voices, followed by Stephanie’s anguished cries. Rita Sue’s heart was breaking. She could hear the phone being jostled, and then she heard a stern voice on the line: “This is Lieutenant Klante with the Florida State Police. Who am I speaking to?”

Rita Sue stroked her Chihuahua’s tiny head. There weren’t any choices left. She had to set things right. She had to throw herself on the fire. “My name is Rita Sue Metzger,” she said. “I killed a man named Vance Scofield. I did it for my baby.”

MARLIN DROVE SOUTH on Highway 281.

Deputy Nicole Brooks lived in the southern tip of Blanco County in an area known as Twin Sisters—named for a pair of prominent hills that could be seen for miles around.

Marlin shook his head and loosened his grip on the steering wheel. He was nervous. He had been ever since Brooks had stopped him in the hall and asked if he still wanted to grab a beer.

“Is my house okay?” she’d asked.

“Yeah, sure.”

“Give me ten minutes, then come on down.”

This was after Garza had promised to keep them all up to date on Stephanie Waring. As it had turned out, the Florida State Police hadn’t even picked her up yet. She’d dialed 911 from a pay phone, and the dispatcher had told her to stay put until a trooper arrived. When and if Garza learned anything important, he’d relay it to Marlin and the deputies. “Y’all just clear out for a couple hours,” the sheriff had said. “Go take a nap or something.”

Now Marlin hung a left on Loma Ranch Road and thought about what he was going to say to Nicole. No doubt about it, he had to be straight with her, tell her why he’d been acting as he had. Then she could laugh in his face and send him on his way.

He found her mailbox, pulled in, and saw her cruiser sitting in the gravel driveway that ran to her small, well-kept house. He’d been here once before, about a month ago, when some people from the sheriff’s office had gathered for an impromptu barbecue. As he remembered, he’d spoken exactly seven words to her: “Hi, Nicole. Nice place you have here.” Later, he’d slipped out without even saying good-bye. She’d been talking to Ernie Turpin at the time, laughing with him, touching his elbow, and the juvenile pangs of jealousy Marlin had felt convinced him it would be best just to leave.

He parked his truck, and when he knocked on the door, Brooks answered wearing a pair of jeans and a dark green top. She didn’t have any shoes on. Her auburn hair was down, and Marlin immediately knew he’d made a huge mistake. She was ridiculously beautiful, and he was afraid he wouldn’t even be able to speak.

“Come on in,” she said, stepping aside. “I’ve got beer, Cokes, or iced tea.

“A cold beer would be great.”

“Take a load off,” she said, gesturing toward the living room. “I’ll be right back.”

“You mind if I make a phone call real quick?”

“Yeah, sure. There’s a phone on the end table.” She disappeared through a swinging door into the kitchen.

Marlin sank into the leather sofa and dialed the cordless phone. He’d already figured out what he would say: “I can’t go into details right now, Phil, but I don’t think you have anything to worry about. I’ll be able to explain more later. Oh, and sorry if I was an ass earlier today.”

But Colby didn’t answer. It was nearly seven o’clock, and there was still plenty of light this time of year. He might still be out working the ranch.

Brooks reappeared with two frosted mugs of beer and handed one to Marlin. “I hope you like light beer.”

“Yeah, sure. Thank you.”

He decided to get right to it. “Nicole, not to beat a dead horse, but I wanted to talk to you about the conversation we had in my truck.”

She frowned. “I thought we’d cleared that up.”

“Well, yeah, maybe. But there’s something more I wanted to say. About the way I’ve been acting.”

She had taken a seat in the matching leather chair, and now she placed her mug on the end table. “I didn’t mean to open up a can of worms. You don’t need to tell me—”

“No, really, I want to explain. It’s been bothering me. All this time, you were thinking I didn’t like you or something, when…” He felt like such a klutz. “Well, the opposite is true.” He searched for the right words to polish off his humiliation. “I think you’re great.”

I
think you’re great?
What kind of lame proclamation was that? Now she’d be flustered and uncomfortable, and they’d exchange some stilted small talk to make the moment go away, and then Marlin would leave, and afterward, the atmosphere between them would be riddled with a clumsy and false friendliness.

He finally brought his eyes to hers.

The surprising thing was, there was a slight grin on her face. “You didn’t have to say that, you know? I consider myself a fairly bright girl. I sort of pieced it together already.”

Marlin felt something loosen in his torso, some bit of tension uncoiling. “You did?”

“Yeah, I’m real clever that way. Might even make a good cop.”

He laughed in spite of himself. Then he remembered the other problem. “The thing is…I don’t want to get into the middle of anything here.”

“Oh, right.” She picked up her mug and took a sip. “Wait. I’m not sure I follow you.” She was staring at him intensely.

“What about Ernie?”

“Ernie? What about him?”

“A couple of days before your picnic, I saw the two of you shopping together.”

“Yeah?”

“Well, if you and Ernie have something going on—”

He was interrupted by laughter. Nicole was giggling so hard, she spilled her beer. Marlin sat there, totally confused. He could feel his face turning red.

“Oh my God,” she finally said, “you didn’t know. That’s why you acted that way in the grocery store.”

Marlin felt like the butt of a joke, and he didn’t understand why. “Know what?”

“This is too funny.”

“Nicole. Know what?”

“Ernie,” she said, “is my cousin.”

“
Your cousin?”

“Yeah, I thought everybody knew.”

“I must’ve missed that somehow.”

“I guess so.”

“I feel kind of stupid.”

“No, don’t.”

“Excuse me while I crawl under the couch.”

“Better not. I haven’t vacuumed under there lately.”

Marlin chuckled.
Her cousin.

Brooks smiled. “Listen, I’ve got an idea. Why don’t we go to lunch sometime next week? That’ll give me another chance to tease you about all this, and then I promise to ease up.”

“That sounds good.”

“Or dinner. Either way.”

“So you’re—everything I told you—the way I feel—”

“I don’t have a problem with it.”

The anxiety was gone. Marlin felt good. Hell, he felt incredible.

Of course, the phone rang and ruined the moment.

Brooks answered, and her demeanor instantly changed. “Yes, sir…Yeah, I can, in about twenty minutes.” She looked at Marlin, and her eyes were wide with surprise. “You’ve got to be kidding…But how—yeah, I understand. No problem. I’ll see you shortly.”

She hung up, shaking her head in amazement. “That was Bobby. Florida troopers picked up Stephanie. But are you ready for this? Rita Sue Metzger just confessed to killing Vance Scofield.”

An hour after sundown, Red was ready to call the owner of the company who built the goddamned safe and threaten to cut his nuts off.

They’d tried drilling it, and the steel-tipped bit had done nothing more than scratch the finish. Billy Don had worked it over with a crowbar, trying to pry the door open, and the crowbar had ended up as straight as a flagpole. Next, Red had taken a jackhammer after the hinges, but all he’d managed to do was drop the damn thing on his foot. He suspected his pinkie toe was broken.

“Ain’t this a bitch?” Lucy said, standing to the side, drinking a tallboy.

Red saw disappointment in her eyes, and it pained him. “We’ll get in there, darlin’, just you wait and see.” But the truth was, he was running out of ideas. Short of dropping the safe off a high-rise in Austin, he didn’t know how they’d crack the bastard open.

Red sat on top of the safe to take a breather. He glanced at Lucy and winked, but she just stared at him in the dim glow of the porch light.

“What about the seven mag?” Billy Don asked.

That idea hadn’t even occurred to Red. “That’s what I was thinking,” he said.

“What’s a seven mag?” Lucy asked.

“Biggest damn deer rifle I got. Thing would stop a chargin’ rhino, even better than taking away his credit cards.”

Red was hoping for a smile—he was just trying to lighten things up a bit—but all Lucy said was, “Well, go get the damn thing then. What are we waiting for?”

He didn’t like this side of her. Snippy. Impatient. Nothing like the gal he’d had in his bedroom earlier in the day. “Be right back.”

Red went inside the trailer, removed the rifle from a case underneath his bed, and grabbed a single shell from his dresser drawer.

Back outside, he slid the round into the chamber. “Now, we’re only gonna be able to do this once. If it sounds like a shooting gallery over here, someone’s liable to call the game warden, and we damn sure don’t want that.”

Lucy pitched a cigarette butt into the weeds. “Let’s do it.”

Red knelt down and studied the safe. In the center of the door was a handle shaped like a four-legged starfish. Right smack in the middle of the handle, that’s where he would aim. Maybe break something loose inside, shake up the tumblers or whatever the hell was in there.

He backed up about twenty yards and laid down on the ground, facing the safe head-on. Then he remembered a video he’d seen on one of those cop shows. A guy was trying to break into a convenience store, and he threw a brick directly at the front window. The brick bounced off and hit him right in the face. So Red scooted over about five yards, giving the shot a slight angle. “Y’all stand behind me,” he said. “Safer that way. Billy Don, point the flashlight at the handle so I can see what the hell I’m doing.”

When they were in position and Billy Don had the light shining on the handle, Red dialed his rifle scope down to the lowest power and squinted through the lens. The handle filled the crosshairs.

“Y’all ready?” he asked.

“Get on with it,” Lucy replied.

Red took a breath, held it, and squeezed the trigger.

The rifle roared, followed by a loud
thunk!
and the whining sound of a ricochet.

Lucy raced forward and examined the damage. Red stayed on the ground, waiting to hear the results. He’d be a hero now, and Lucy would thank him accordingly. In all kinds of interesting ways.

“Not a damn thing,” she muttered. “Not even a dent.” She turned around. “There’s not even a goddamn dent!”

Red didn’t care for her tone. “Well, Jesus, it was your idea to steal the safe—but did you have any ideas about how we was gonna actually open it up? It don’t appear that you did.”

She shook her head and stomped up the steps into the trailer.

Meanwhile, Billy Don had wandered over to Red’s truck and was fingering a dime-sized hole in the tailgate. “Lookee here, Red. You bagged yourself a Ford.”

Nicole Brooks was in the interview room, in uniform again, her hair back in its familiar braid. Marlin watched her through the one-way glass, along with Bill Tatum and Ernie Turpin. She appeared comfortable and collected as she positioned the microphone and inserted a cassette into the recorder. Rita Sue Metzger was directly across from her, Bobby Garza to her left.

Garza had asked Brooks to lead the interview—a tremendous responsibility and a hell of a vote of confidence. The sheriff had speculated that Rita Sue might be more comfortable speaking to a woman. There didn’t appear to be much that could calm Rita Sue’s nerves at the moment, though. Her eyes darted around the room. She kept clearing her throat, and she was petting her Chihuahua’s head so furiously that Marlin thought she might accidentally rub the little dog bald. It was a nice touch by Bobby—allowing her to bring the dog along.

“Mrs. Metzger,” Brooks said, “I’m going to ask you about the statement you made to Lieutenant Klante, the officer you spoke to in Florida. Would you please repeat it for me and Sheriff Garza?”

Rita Sue stopped stroking the dog for a moment, and rubbed her hands together nervously. “Ain’t I supposed to have a lawyer?”

Marlin noticed that Garza opened his mouth as if to speak, but he let Brooks address it.

“As I mentioned earlier when I informed you of your rights,” she said, “we can certainly provide an attorney for you if that’s what you want. But there’s really no need for one. We’re just trying to get to the truth. If you’re ready to tell us what happened, we’re ready to listen. There’s no reason to get anyone else involved.”

Rita Sue nodded, but Marlin wondered how much she really understood. Did she fully realize that she didn’t have to answer any questions? Did she know that her statement to Klante could easily be brushed aside by any competent criminal attorney? Many defendants did more damage to themselves by opening their mouths than all of the other evidence combined.

For a long moment, nobody spoke. The dog whined, and Rita Sue went back to petting it. Then she simply blurted it out: “I killed Vance Scofield.”

Marlin realized that until then he had been holding his breath. Now he let it out slowly. Phil Colby was, without question, officially in the clear.

“Could you tell us when and where this happened?” Brooks asked casually.

“At his house on Sunday morning.”

“Inside or outside?”

Rita Sue bowed her head, looking down at the dog. “Outside.”

“How did this come to pass?”

“Pardon?”

“What happened exactly? What led up to the incident?”

Again, there was a long pause. Garza shifted in his chair but didn’t say anything. Brooks waited with an expression of empathy on her face. Finally, Rita Sue spoke again. “Vance Scofield was dating my daughter. I’m sorry I had to lie to y’all about that—saying I hadn’t heard of him. I hadn’t ever met him, but I did know that Stephanie had been seeing him for several months. But the problem was, he treated her something terrible. Always running around on her with other women. They talked about getting married, but he never did anything about it. No ring or nothing. Took advantage of her, that’s what he done. I told Lucas—” She stopped talking abruptly, and her hand went to her mouth.

“Mrs. Metzger,” Brooks said, “we know that Stephanie and Lucas were in Florida together. Stephanie has already told the Florida police that they had a romantic relationship. She also told them everything that Lucas told her. About finding Vance. I understand completely if you’re fond of Lucas—we all like him—but it will be best if you tell me everything. In fact, it will be the best thing for him if you just tell the truth.”