A Thousand Falling Crows (26 page)

Sometime in the late afternoon, the door opened, rousing Carmen from her sleep. She looked over her shoulder and relaxed as soon as she saw a familiar silhouette standing just inside.

“Here,” she whispered, “there's room for both of us.”

He hesitated, then closed the door and made his way slowly to the bed. Carmen had her shift on and that was all. She scooted over to the wall, her back to him, and was glad for the presence in her bed.

He eased up next to her tepidly, fitting his body next to hers. They fit together like two puzzle pieces. That had always been the trouble with Eddie. He made her feel good, made her feel like she never had before. He always left her wanting him more.

“I was worried about you,” she whispered. She couldn't help herself. His body felt good, pressing against her back. She rolled her hips slightly and pushed into him. His hot breath on her ear sent shimmers of electricity down her spine, not stopping until they found that special spot between her legs.

When he didn't respond, she pushed against him harder. He gasped, then ran his hand down her leg, kissed her on the base of her neck, then nuzzled into her.

Carmen could feel him getting hard, encouraging her not to stop moving. But she was cautious, kept her voice to herself even though it was difficult. She wanted to moan out loud when he ran his had up her leg and didn't stop at her thigh. He kept going and probed into her wetness with his finger, curious, gentle, but unrelenting. He knew just where to touch her.

She was vibrating now, lost in the feeling. Nothing that had happened in the last couple of days mattered. All that mattered was what was happening now. And that he continued to do what he was doing. “Don't stop.”

Carmen reached around, and pulled up her shift, then felt his pants, rubbed the rock that was there, aching to escape. She easily undid each button, and with his help, freed him of all that had restrained him.

He found her wetness easily and slid into her but held back, then started to rock slowly, quietly. Time stopped ticking, the world stopped spinning, and when he finished and pulled out of her, Carmen smiled. She had known that it wasn't Eddie as soon as he had eased his finger into her. Eddie never touched her like that.

CHAPTER 24

All Sonny could taste was the sand in the back of his teeth. The promise to Aldo echoed in his mind, making the gritty flavor of Texas dirt even worse. He knew better than to make promises like that; We'll bring your chica back home. It was against every code he had abided by in his professional life. Every code, except the one he served now—the one that didn't exist. He was not beholden to any organization's rules. There was no state or local government laws to answer to. He was free to do and say what he wanted to. But that didn't matter. He had given the grieving man false hope, and, to Sonny's way of thinking, that was a crime within itself. He would have to apologize. It was as simple as that.

But the realization that he was held by no bounds felt like electricity running through his entire body. And the feeling stopped at his stump. There was no phantom pain, no wishes for a new arm that were impossible to fulfill.

Blue was sitting where he liked it best, next to the window so he could stick his head out of it. Aldo had disappeared back inside the house, and Sonny was left with the choice of going up to the door and making amends or going into town to see if he could find out where Frank Hamer was and how to get ahold of him—or going home and just leaving things be.

He wasn't going home, that was certain. And he wasn't going straight into town, even though he'd decided that talking to Hamer was a way to set things right with Aldo. But there was a stop he thought needed to make first, on the way.

With a confident combination of moves, Sonny mastered the ballet of putting the truck into reverse. He eased it out into the lane, pointed the truck in the opposite direction of his house, and headed back toward Wellington.

Pete Jorgenson's house looked all buttoned up. Blinds drawn. Doors closed. No sign of a car or truck in the yard.

Sonny parked the truck in front of the porch and craned his neck to see if the one chicken that was there before was in the coop—and he couldn't tell. The nearest coop looked empty, giving Sonny a bad feeling and another reason for distaste in his mouth.
Was it possible that Pete and Lidde had packed up what they needed and run off?
It was a valid question to ask, and one that Sonny hoped he was wrong about, especially considering there was another dead girl to add to the sheriff's list.

Blue wagged his tail, and Sonny helped him out of the truck. It looked like the dog's limp was getting a little less painful, a little better—but that might have been nothing but wishful thinking. The broken bone had not had time to heal.

About halfway up to the house, Lidde walked out of the front door, a grim look on her round face and a broom held tightly in her hand. She started when she looked up and saw Sonny. “I didn't hear you pull up,” she said, stopping in the center of the porch.

“Didn't mean to sneak up on you, Lidde.” Blue bolted around Sonny and limped as quickly as he could up to see Lidde, his tail wagging like the pendulum of a clock gone haywire.

Lidde smiled and leaned down and petted the dog. “Looks like he's gonna be okay.” There was always a hint of Sweden in her voice. Today it was especially noticeable. Her words were drawn out slow, with rolling syllables, hitting the high notes in odd places for most Texans.

Sonny stopped about fifteen feet from the woman. “He seems to like being around. Hasn't tried to run off, yet. Not that he could easily enough, but he just kind of accepted where he was at and made himself at home.”

“That's good, Sonny. You needed a dog about you.”

Sonny smiled, then let it quickly fade away. “Pete around? I‘d kind of like to talk to him for a minute.”

Lidde tilted her head. “He's out back in the barn. Making sure all is well. That there was some fierce dust storm. Likes of I haven't seen before, but expect to again, sad as that may be.”

Sonny nodded. “Seems to be the way of things. You mind keeping an eye on Blue while I go talk to Pete?”

“Nah, nah, you go ahead. Me and Blue'll have us a visit. I‘ll teach him a trick or two if I have the time.” She leaned and patted the dog's head. Blue seemed to like her. He barked and tried to jump up on her apron, but realized halfway up that it was going to hurt when he landed. He yelped slightly when the bandaged leg and paw came down on the porch floor. Lidde swept up the dog and cradled him like he was a newborn baby. “There, there, let's go see if I can find a good bone for you.”

“I won't be long.” Sonny walked off toward the barn. He felt bad for considering that Pete and Lidde might have had reason to run off, that they were involved in any of the three girls' murders. Seeing Lidde with Blue reminded him of her tenderness, and he was certain, at that moment, that she couldn't have been involved in the horror that was laying out in that field.

The barn was a long one, meant for dairy cows, but there wasn't much grass these days for cows to chew on, and Pete hadn't ever used it for that purpose, at least as far as Sonny could remember.

It smelled like all barns, a mixture of straw, rotting food, and mouse piss that somehow all combined into a pleasurable, expected odor. Light rushed in the door as Sonny pushed inside without any hesitation. All of the sashes were pulled to on the windows, not allowing the sun, or any dust, inside.

A feral cat scurried out of the way, and Sonny stopped just inside the door to get his bearings. He'd been in the barn countless times before, but never when it was dark inside. From what he could remember, there were old cars, tractors, and a heap of rusted old metal strung about, along with stalls full of crates and cages that held all sorts of critters.

Pete took in all kinds of animals, not just the domestic. If someone found an injured deer or fox out and about and didn't have the heart or inclination to shoot it, they'd bring it to Pete. So there were a variety of animals inside the barn. Cows, birds, even a three-legged coyote, along with various cats and dogs, either stray, or left behind by folks who just couldn't pay Pete for taking care of them.

It didn't take long for Sonny's eyes to adjust, and he saw the glow of a railroad lantern at the opposite end of the barn. “Hey, Pete, that you?” Sonny called out.

A response took a second to come back, but one came pretty quick. “Yah, yah, it's me. You stay right there. I‘ll be over in a second.”

Not wanting to navigate the ins and outs of the barn without a light, Sonny did what he was told. He had no reason to be in a hurry.

Something moved about in the hayloft above him. Might have been a rat or a cat, it was hard to tell. Might've even been a barn owl out for an afternoon snack. Either way, Sonny stepped back, and reached around to the gun that was stuffed between his pants and undershirt. He didn't care for rats at all. Mice he could tolerate, but big rodents made him nervous.

“What brings ya out this way, Ranger Burton? Day's been as ugly as any I can remember.” Pete Jorgenson appeared out of the darkness without the lamp. He had on work clothes, sleeves rolled up, and his left hand was covered with dried blood.

“Been a worse day for me,” Sonny said. “What'd you get yourself into?” Nodding at Pete's hands.

“I was butcherin' a suckling pig when the storm blew up. I guess I forgot to clean myself up. Wasn't expectin' anyone to be out.”

Sonny nodded. “They found another girl, Pete.”

Pete exhaled and looked at the ground. “That why you're here?”

Sonny shrugged, stared at Pete to see if he could get a feeling one way or another about what was truly going on in the man's mind and heart. It was hard to tell. A steel curtain had fallen over the Swede's face; he looked like a carved bust sitting on some piano teacher's shelf.

Pete finally looked up and shook his head. “Lord have mercy on those poor girls' souls. Ain't never heard of such a thing in all of my life.”

“You don't know anything about it then?”

“You official, yah?”

“Just curious.”

“Jonesy done been out. More 'an once. Not today, of course, but now that I know there's been another killin', well, I 'spect to see him drive up. I‘ll have to tell Lidde. She frets about all them girls. This will break her heart for sure. We hoped it was just a tramp passin' through, you know, but this killer seems like he's gonna stay, along with all the rest of the bad news.”

Sonny watched Pete's face intently. He'd always been a pretty good judge of the truth, or a lie, when he heard it. His judgment was clouded, though, because he liked Pete and Lidde. He would have never considered them suspects of something so heinous—but Sonny knew it was hard to know what a person was really capable of doing. He'd seen a lot of good people do bad things. “You haven't had a girl here lately?”

Pete shook his head. “Not since early spring. You got to understand, it ain't like we take appointments. They just show up at the door. Lidde, she takes them in, makes sure they eat right, rest, know how to care for a child if they want to keep it. Most don't. They want to leave it here like such a thing never happened and get on with their lives. Sometimes, they come with a note and money pinned by their momma, grandmother, asking for us to make this trouble go away as soon as we can, but we can't do that. We have to wait out the time, you understand.”

“Take care of it,” Sonny said, recalling the pool of blood underneath the girl's dress.

“End the life. You know what I mean.”

“I was just making sure.”

Both men took a breath and let any words they were thinking just pass on by. Whatever had been moving in the hayloft above them had scurried away and taken to hiding again. Silence returned to the barn.

“We don't have nothing to do with killing any creature. Not by oath or creed but by what is right. Only to end the sufferin', that's all. I‘ve spent my life tryin' to ease the pain of all living things. Killin' a child or its mother is something that only a monster could do. And that's not me. I‘ve said the same thing to Jonesy, and I‘ll say it to you: Lidde and I had nothin' to do with any of this foul business. We help girls. We don't kill them. And for anyone to think such a thing, well, it offends us greatly. But we understand, yah, why we would be the first ones to come to mind.”

“I‘m sorry, Pete. I shouldn't have come by.”

“I‘m glad you did.” Pete stepped forward and put his big hand on Sonny's shoulder. “Come on, I think Lidde has some iced tea ready. Be a fine thing to share with you and speak of pleasanter things. If you've got time.”

“I‘ve got time.”

They headed out the door and were halfway to the house when a car pulled in and parked behind Sonny's truck.

It was a familiar car, one with a spiderweb windshield. It was Jesse.