Dead Man Falls (20 page)

"So, you’d pick Mary Ann?"

He shook his head. "No. I wouldn’t want either one of them. But since we’re coming clean about things, and for the sake of honesty." He gave me a pointed look that I didn’t much care for. "There’s something you need to know. I almost asked Rhonda to marry me once."

I sucked in my breath. "What!"

Jerry grinned. "Got your attention, huh?"

"Yeah." I punched the remote, stopping Skipper in the midst of his first exasperation. "But you’re lying."

"No, I’m not," he said seriously. "I really thought about it. When it came down to actually doing it, however, I wasn’t that noble."

He ran his hand through the wavy black hair and sighed. He hadn’t explained anything, yet I could already guess where this was headed. Maybe not specifically, but in a general "save the lost puppy" kind of way. He had never been in love with Rhonda and I knew it, but he’d always had some kind of strange connection to her that I resented. I didn’t say anything, just waited for him to say what he needed to.

"Remember when we were in the sixth grade and Rhonda moved into a house a few blocks from the school?"

Yes, I did. Vividly. That had been the real beginning of our rivalry. As I recalled, her mother had married a guy named Davenport, hence Rhonda’s name, and they’d moved into the house by the school about the same time. I don’t know if they owned the place, or if Mr. Davenport already lived there, or what, as those details weren’t particularly important to an eleven-year-old. Funny, I also couldn’t remember what her name had been before it became Davenport. "Older white frame house with a little tiny fenced front yard, right?"

"Yeah. Did you ever go inside?"

Believe it or not, I actually had. "Just once. I walked over with her at lunch to get something, we were maybe in sixth or seventh grade. I don’t even remember what she went to get or why I went with her, but it was probably the last time we even pretended we could stand each other."

Jerry tapped his fingers lightly on the desk. "Remember much about the house, the family?"

"Not really. We didn’t stay but a couple of minutes. I think her dad, step-dad, was there."

"He was home with her a lot," Jerry continued. "He didn’t work much, if at all, mostly hung around the house and drank, I think."

The shudder shook through me before the memories fully caught up with me, at least consciously.

The house had been dark and not very neat. The man had been in the living room, sitting in an old recliner with frayed sides, watching television. He’d yelled something at her. At the time, I didn’t even recognize the words or the slurred delivery, or maybe I just blocked it all out. Now, as an adult thinking back, I knew he’d been calling her vulgar names and that he’d been drunk. A sickening wave rolled through me. She’d grabbed a notebook, a green spiral, and run from the house. I’d run with her. Once we crossed the street onto school grounds, Rhonda relaxed and it was as if nothing was wrong.

The churning in my stomach told me I already knew Jerry’s secret. "She was abused, wasn’t she?"

"Yeah."

The guy had given me the creeps and I hadn’t even gotten a good look at him, don’t know that I ever saw him at all. But he’d inspired instant distrust and fear. "When did you find out?"

"I was maybe fourteen, walking in front of the house. The window was open. I heard him yelling at her, saying horrible things. He slapped her and shoved her down on the bed."

Oh, God, I could guess what had happened after that. I didn’t want to hear it any more than he wanted to verbalize it, but we both knew. And for the first time, my heart went out to Rhonda.

I felt my eyes tearing up, for Rhonda, for Jerry, and even for dumb me who should have done something, who should have known something was very wrong in that household. I pushed up off the bed, walked to the desk and looped my arms around his neck. "Now I feel really awful. I can’t begin to imagine what she endured."

"I imagined it for years, but I didn’t do anything about it. I should have."

"Oh, Jerry, what could you have done? You were a child. Even if you told an adult--"

"I told my dad, but nothing ever changed as far as I knew, and he wouldn’t ever talk about it."

"So you think marrying her would have saved her, made all her problems go away?"

"It would have helped."

I pressed a soft kiss to his temple. "Wouldn’t have helped you."

"Or her either, probably." He turned and looked up at me, smiling just a little. "I felt sorry for her and I felt guilty for what I knew, but I didn’t much like her."

I laughed. "Careful, now, you’re sounding a little like me."

He scooted his chair around and pulled me onto his lap. "I better watch it then, we don’t need two of you."

I ran my fingers along his cheek and the smooth line of his jaw. "You have no idea--"

An obscene buzzing ring jolted me in mid-confession. When I realized the phone on the desk behind me was the source of my irritation, I also felt a relief. I had been about two words away from saying something seriously stupid. I couldn’t remember exactly where I’d been heading, but it was in the direction of sap, such as "How I’ve missed you" or "We’ve been apart too long" or something equally nauseating. The dreaded "L" word might have even cropped up.

As Jerry reached around me and picked up the receiver, I stood and stepped away.

"Sheriff Parker," he said, his voice very deep and very official. "Fifteen minutes. Fine. We’ll be there."

We? Oh, boy. Sounded like a trip to the police station was on my agenda now. At least it beat sitting here watching TV.

I wandered over to the dresser mirror, ran a comb through my hair, fluffed the top a little and tucked the sides behind my ears. There’s only so much I can do with it in the heat and humidity, but I’d rather have it curly than plastered down with no body whatsoever. I slid on a pair of dangly polished stone earrings, then opened my little billfold/purse thing and glazed my lips with a clear and moisturizing gloss. In the mirror, I could see Jerry sitting at the desk, looking down at a business card and punching in numbers.

"John, this is Jerry. One o’clock good with you?"

He glanced at me and I pretended not to notice. His face scrunched up into a scowl and I feared he was having second thoughts about letting me out of captivity.

"Yeah, Rick got the fax this morning. He’s having somebody there type up statements today." He glanced at me again. "Unless I change my mind." After a lengthy silence on Jerry’s part, he finally muttered, "Yeah, I know. Let’s just wait and see how it goes tomorrow."

After he hung up, I turned around and smiled--a small little smile rather than the wide grin I felt like sprouting. "Where are we going to meet Rick for lunch?"

Jerry strummed his fingers on the desk again. I’ve noticed he does this when he’s contemplating how to deal with me. I’ve also noticed it isn’t a particularly good sign. "I’m meeting Rick for lunch," he said.

Uh oh. "But you said ‘we’ on the phone. We means you and me. Right?"

He shoved back from the desk and stood, sighing and muttering. "I make far better professional decisions when you’re not around to confuse me."

Huh? I confuse him? That sounded like a good thing, although I did not smile about it. "Actually, Jerry, I don’t think I’ve done anything wrong in the last few minutes so I don’t know that I’m to blame for anything right now."

He stared at me some more, then checked his watch. "Before we go, I need to go give Amy a call and check on the kids. They should have gotten back from Dallas last night. I need to let her know I’m going to be tied up for a few days."

We again. Good sign. Really good sign. "Tell Amy I said hi," I said enthusiastically. I meant it sincerely as I really do like Amy. Someday, if I ever hang around long enough, I figure we might even get to be actual friends.

Amy wasn’t home and he wound up leaving a generic message on her answering machine. Just as well. She would be terribly upset to know Jerry was on the latest lunatic killer’s hit list. Just because she divorced him--and now dated women--didn’t mean she didn’t care about him. In truth, she probably still felt the same way about Jerry as she always had. She cared for him--for lack of a better term--like a brother. He still felt the sting of her rejection, but he'd moved on to accepting the situation. He seemed to genuinely like her too. Not your usual divorce relationship, and certainly not like mine.

"I heard Amy has a new friend."

"Yes."

"Are you okay with it?"

He shrugged. "I’m doing better. She’s keeping it very low key around the kids and I appreciate that."

"You know, I wish I could have your attitude about Danny." The thought of my ex-husband, Danny-the-cheating-cradle-robber, does not make me warm and tingly. "Seeing him with the little twit he left me for, who is only a couple of years older than my daughter, for god-sakes, tends to really piss me off."

Jerry grinned. "No different for me, Jolene."

"I know it," I said, thinking how much worse it had to be for him. "I also know it really isn’t about me, what I did or didn’t do. It’s about him. And it’s about Amy." Jerry nodded in agreement. "I’m just a little more emotional about things than you are."

Jerry nodded again--a little too emphatically, if you asked me--but I let it slide.

"Even so," he said, "I bet you handled things just fine when your kids were little. The kids have to come first. It doesn’t do anybody any good to fight about something that’s over and done with."

"You’re right. And believe it or not, I always made it a point to not talk bad about Danny in front of the kids. What I said to my friends was another matter. But, I don’t hate him anymore--or Bambi, or whatever her name is. In fact, I’m coming to appreciate what he did. If not for his mid-life crisis, I’d probably still be married to the fool."

"And you wouldn’t be here with me right now."

"Bingo." I smiled. "I’d pursue that issue with enthusiasm except that you told Rick you’d be somewhere in fifteen minutes."

Jerry glanced at his watch again. "I really did intend to make you stay here."

I grabbed my billfold from the dresser and bounced toward him. I wasn’t going to be stuck in the room after all. "Now, really, Jerry, in the whole scheme of things, what good would that do?"

I did not wait for him to answer, just grabbed his arm and ushered him to the door.

* * * *

When we got down to the parking garage, I discovered that we had our very own officer sitting in an unmarked car watching the place. He also followed us to the restaurant, a local Mexican variety. I felt bad that we got to go in out of the heat and he had to sit out there and swelter. He did find some shade so that helped ease my worries some.

Rick met us inside the door and led us to a back corner booth--dark and private. I scooted in on the side opposite a stack of folders and Jerry sat next to me.

Rick slid in the booth across from us, grinning. "I got some information back on a few of those questions you had, Jolene."

"Really?" I said, trying to sound pleased, but not really remembering what those really good questions had been. When I’m on a roll, I can come up with all sorts of ideas. The problem is, once I’ve played the hand, I tend to forget what the cards were or why they were important. "What did you find out?"

The waitress dropped off a basket of chips and salsa, then took our drink order--iced tea all around. I wasn’t all that hungry since we’d had breakfast a mere three and a half hours ago, but I knew better than to pass up a chance for food. Besides, I consider it my duty to sample a chile rellaño at every Mexican food establishment I enter. The best-flavored ones I ever had were in Denver at a place on Colfax. Since it went out of business, I’ve been on a mission to find something even close. I doubted I’d hit the jackpot in Redwater Falls, but stranger things have happened. The waitress was back in a flash with drinks and took our orders. We all munched on chips and salsa for a few minutes before Rick got back to business.

"Okay," Rick said, flipping open a folder. "Here’s what we know for sure. Rhonda Davenport did have a baby. In Abilene."

I glanced Jerry. "She wasn’t lying about that part." Wait a minute. I looked over at Rick. "How’d you get this information so fast? I thought getting adoption records took an act of God, or Congress, or at least a court order."

Detective Richard Rankin’s lips twitched, but he couldn’t stop the twinkle in his eyes. For the first time this trip, I saw the cute beach boy persona emerge. Surfer Dude was back and he was ready to strut. "I pulled a few strings." He grinned, just bursting with boyish charm. "I know a judge."

And in the biblical sense, no doubt. I couldn’t help but smile at him. "I bet you do."

Jerry chuckled a little. "I think I’d rather not know how you got the information, just what it is."

"You’re not going to believe who Rhonda listed as the father of her baby."

My heart dove into my stomach and flopped around rather sick-like. I tried to smile and keep my tone light as I said, "Our pal the sheriff?"

Jerry propped an arm on the table and leaned around to look me in the eye. "Now, Jolene, even if she did, we’d both know that was a lie, now wouldn’t we?"

"It wasn’t Jerry," Rick said, pulling a paper from the folder and turning it toward us. "It was Willard Pollock. The principal."

"What?" Jerry and I gasped in unison.

"Yeah," Rick said, pointing out a box on an official looking form. "Look right here. Willard Pollock. Can you believe that?"

I would have believed Rhonda had been with just about anybody--or everybody--including the entire football team. But the old guy principal? Eeeww. Rhonda and Willie? An image of the two together kept flashing in my mind, but it seemed unbelievable, not to mention gross. "Do you think it’s really true?"

"I guess only two people would know about that for sure," Jerry said.

I’d been staring at the birth certificate, but not really seeing it. I shook my head to clear my vision--but Pollock’s name refused to leave. Finally, I figured out why. The first thing I’d seen was the father’s name. Then Rhonda’s. Only now did I see the name of the baby: Willard James Pollock, Junior.