Authors: Ace Atkins
“Sometimes.”
“Skinny cows devouring fat cows. Grain eating other grain. Hell.”
“Crazy.”
“I hate to dream,” Luther said, taking a bite of catfish.
Donnie looked up on the wall and spotted a photograph of old Judge Blanton, a Korean War vet who’d been a good friend to his dad. His father caught him staring.
“You make it through the Chosin Reservoir and get offed at the Dixie Gas station in Tibbehah County.”
“He made a stand,” Luther said, working the white meat from the fish’s bones. “He was a good man.”
“I heard he done got himself killed ’cause he felt shame for throwing in with Johnny Stagg.”
Luther shot Donnie a look, the kind of look that used to mean Donnie’d be left with a sore ass from the flat of his daddy’s hand. He didn’t talk for a long while, reaching for some Tabasco. “Heard you were over at the truck stop the other day,” Luther said.
“Damn, you can’t take a shit in this town without someone smellin’ it.”
“You got business with Stagg?” Luther asked.
“Just getting my piston greased.”
Luther nodded, but, god damn, that old coot knew. What’d he want, for Donnie to keep working a shift at the convenience store?
Luther said: “You can work for me some more. Pick up an extra shift.”
“I’m making money.”
Luther nodded again, scraping up some more on his plate, washing it down with some sweet tea. Donnie got up to buy a dollar beer and sat back down, his daddy’s eyes with that rheumy, faraway look that he always thought of as being on Da Nang time.
“I’m sorry for what happened to you, Donnie.”
“I’m here, ain’t I?”
“Sometimes I can’t sleep,” Luther said, “me being the one pushed you into the Guard.”
“Can’t drive a truck forever,” Donnie said. “Ain’t shit to do around here since the plant closed.”
Luther nodded, thinking the best thing about the VFW might’ve been the cold beer. They damn sure know how to ice a son of a bitch.
“You seen Quinn Colson since you been back?”
Donnie nodded.
“I know he’s been trying to round up a couple more deputies.”
Donnie snorted so hard, some Budweiser flushed out his nose. “Shit.”
“How’s that?” Luther said, stubbing out his millionth cigarette, starting up a new one.
“I got everything in hand,” Donnie said.
“What’s wrong with being on the right side?”
“You believe Quinn Colson won’t find a way to get himself paid?”
“He grew up.”
“Well, good for him, Dad.”
“SO WHO IS YOUR FATHER?”
Lillie asked Mara in the Tibbehah County Sheriff’s Office conference room less than an hour later.
“Fred Black.”
“The welder?” Lillie asked.
Mara nodded.
“I know Fred,” Lillie said. “He built a nice wrought-iron fence for my mother. Is he still in Jericho?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Quinn hung back against the glass door. He’d been sheriff for six months, and this was the first serious interrogation he’d ever watched. Lillie took the lead since she had more law enforcement experience than anyone in the department, with her five years as a cop in Memphis.
“Can I get you something to eat?” Lillie asked.
“No, ma’am.”
“Listen, Mara,” Lillie said. “I’ll put it this way: I don’t think you’re a part of all this. How ’bout a Coke?”
“I’m not talking.”
“I just want to get you a Coke, Mara. That doesn’t mean anything.”
“I only came back to get some clothes,” she said. “What’s wrong with that? I didn’t do nothin’.”
“We got warrants out for your mother,” Lillie said. “You’re eighteen and can be prosecuted as an adult. But I don’t think that’s right. I don’t think you got much choice in all this.”
“I just needed clean underwear.”
“How about a shoe box full of money?” Quinn asked from the wall.
“I’ll take that Coke,” Mara said.
Quinn walked to the back of the department to a Coca-Cola machine that had probably been there since the 1960s and got a bottle, cracking off the cap. He headed back into Lillie’s office and handed it to the pudgy little girl. She was still wearing her pink hat on her fat little head.
“What happened to the child?” Lillie was asking.
“She fell out of a grocery cart.”
“You see it?”
“I think I’m gonna be sick.”
“Did your momma hit that child?”
“No.”
“Did she hit you?”
“That baby’s in rough shape,” Quinn said.
“Where is she?”
“St. Jude,” Quinn said. “Her skull was cracked. Ribs snapped like matchsticks.”
“She gonna make it?” Mara said. Her voice sounded small. Head dropped into her chubby hands.
Nobody said anything. The silence in the station was electric. The bottle of Coke just sat there, fizzing, with Mara frozen and staring into nothing. Quinn couldn’t note any emotion at all until the tears started to come. But the face was passive and dull, almost bovine. She didn’t even seem to notice the tears.
“Where are the other children?” Lillie asked.
Mara was silent.
“What about Ramón?” Quinn asked. “What’s he do?”
“Nothin’.”
“Are the children all Mexican?” Lillie asked.
Mara nodded.
“How many?” Lillie asked.
Quinn listened.
“Eleven.”
“There were thirteen cribs.”
“She only got eleven now.”
“What’s she do with them?” Lillie asked, taking a seat across from the girl.
“Helps them find homes.”
“For a price?” Lillie asked, leaning forward.
Mara nodded.
“So she sells babies,” Lillie said. “That’s pretty illegal, Mara. I sure would appreciate you working with us. We’re worried about those children.”
Mara shook her head, took off her pink hat, and wiped her face and big eyes clean.
“Is she still in the state?” Quinn asked.
Mara shook her head some more. Lillie looked up to Quinn, Quinn leaning his butt on the desk with arms folded across his chest. He shrugged.
“Are you worried about the baby?” Lillie asked.
Mara was sobbing now, leaning down between her knees and making retching sounds. Lillie stood over her and rubbed her back.
“Sheriff, can you call about that child?” Lillie asked.
Lillie nodded to Quinn, and Quinn walked back to his office. He had the hospital number written on a yellow legal pad on his desk. He was transferred around a bit before he was able to talk to an administrator on duty. He’d spoken to the woman before, the woman obviously half asleep, but she promised to call him back with an update.
She called back a few minutes later, and Quinn walked back to the conference room.
Quinn said: “That baby is dead.”
The heaving and sobbing and retching all came pretty fast and hard now. Mara fell from the chair and curled into a fetal ball, screaming and yelling. Quinn leaned against the desk. Lillie dropped down on a knee and soothed her back some more, telling her she was very worried about the other children and that Mara wasn’t to blame.
The shuddering and cries broke down after a while, and the sobbing turned to a smattering of coughs. Lillie reached out her hand and helped the fat little girl to her feet. Her sweatshirt had a picture of Tinker Bell on it.
“Where’s your momma?” Lillie said. “Is she still in the state?”
Mara’s face was a reddened, puffy mess. She shook her head and wiped her bug eyes. “No, ma’am.”
“Where?” Quinn asked.
Mara turned her eyes to him and coughed. “Memphis.”
10
THE FASTEST WAY OUT OF TIBBEHAH COUNTY WAS TAKING THE NATCHEZ
Trace up to Tupelo. It was 0500 by the time Lillie drove the old winding trapper and Indian route by moonlight, passing through the thick humps of Indian mounds and long stretches of virgin oak and pine, Quinn riding shotgun and studying the scenery. They refueled just after they got onto Highway 78, heading through the north Mississippi towns of New Albany, Potts Camp, Holly Springs, Red Banks, and Olive Branch. By the time the Jeep hit the state line, the sun had just started rising over the Mississippi River. Lillie pulled off again, this time for coffee and biscuits at a Shell station, and for Quinn to check in with the shift commander at the Airways Precinct to see if they could get a couple uniform officers to help them serve a warrant.
Lillie had explained, Quinn not knowing this, that the local law had to be present not only in case some shit went down but because they were the ones who had to make the actual arrest. They’d have to extradite the Torres family—if they were able to catch them—back to Tibbehah County. Lillie rolled down the window, lighting up a cigarette, and surmised they might need a horse trailer to truck Janet’s big ass back to Jericho.
“Being inside that house makes me think these folks aren’t even human,” Quinn said.
“We aren’t paid to be psychologists,” Lillie said. “Just get them to court.”
“You think those kids are still with them?”
“Don’t know,” Lillie said, flicking her cigarette out onto the road. “But let’s not take any chances. We’ll get the Memphis cops to go in first. I know you want to be the first to point that gun at Ramón and Janet, but, trust me, it’ll make it go better with the D.A.”
“I wonder how these two shitbirds met,” Quinn said.
“Maybe found each other on eHarmony,” Lillie said. “Both of them being good Christians that like going to the beach, puppy dogs, and sunsets.”
“What’s in it for him?”
“Maybe she pays him,” Lillie said. “Maybe it’s not a marriage at all but a business deal. Them being married gets his ass a green card.”
“He earned it.”
“We treat either one of them with some contempt and it’ll fuck up the case,” Lillie said. “I want them both in our jail, and I want you and me to file every bit of paper we can on these people. I want those children in a safe place, and I want the Torreses to be locked up in a cage a good long while.”
“You know Kenny kept one of those dogs,” Quinn said. “Spent five hundred on getting her cleaned up and dewormed and all.”
“Yep,” Lillie said. “That’s something Kenny would do.”
Lillie and Quinn followed 78 until it turned into Lamar Avenue in south Memphis, running through all those warehouses and big-rig garages, cheap motels for truckers to sleep, and barbecue joints to grab a sandwich, or western-wear shops for some new cowboy boots. The road soon turned into a clustered section of beauty parlors and pawnshops, used-car dealerships, and storefront churches. The Stonewall Jackson Motel was a half mile off the I-240 loop, tired and haggard and having seen its best days when Ike had been president. There had been a pool at one point, but it had been filled in, with thick weeds growing in the center. The motel was one story and a deep U shape. Lots of transient cars with out-of-state license plates littered the parking lot, probably laborers cutting through town. The sign outside the small registration lobby boasted free hbo.
You could hear the trucks and cars zipping past the old highway on the bypass. The sound of it made the motel seem lost and insignificant.
“Sometimes the chickenshits are the worst arrests,” Lillie said, parking and turning off the engine. “Domestics. Drunks. I had a crackhead bite me on the tit once.”
“I’ll be careful.”
“Like you were with Boom?”
“I got him home.”
“He gonna go back to the VA? See that therapist?”
“I don’t know,” Quinn said. “I thought about offering him a job.”
“A one-armed deputy?” Lillie said. “Boom’s strong, but he couldn’t pass the academy physical.”
“I got somethin’ else in mind,” Quinn said. “Something that would set his mind in the right direction.”
Lillie and Quinn climbed out of the Jeep and joined up with a couple street officers with the Memphis PD. Both of them black men in their thirties in stiff blues. They made introductions, and the men pointed out Unit 22, where the night clerk said the Torreses had registered. The men were both drinking coffee. Lillie showed them the warrant signed that morning by a judge in Tibbehah County.
“Where the fuck is that?” one of the cops asked.
“South of Tupelo, north of Starkville,” Lillie said.
“Never heard of it,” the cop said.
“Neither have most people.”
“Y’all in the hill country,” the other cop said. “My people from Marshall County.”
The night manager was a dark-skinned doughy man with badly thinning hair and the bulging eyes of a bulldog. He didn’t bother to speak to any of the cops, only reached into an old pair of black dress pants and pulled out a passkey, muttering to himself about the couple being the only guests who’d paid for the week. Lillie showed him the warrant, but it didn’t seem to make a difference, he didn’t question anything they asked. He looked to be Pakistani, and Quinn asked him something in Pashto.
The man just stared at him with a blank look and walked to the door. He knocked a couple times. The man had sweated a great deal through a very threadbare Grizzlies T-shirt, the perspiration forming a V at the nape of his neck. He knocked some more, and Quinn exchanged looks with the cops. The man turned and shrugged, crossing his arms over a fat little potbelly.
“You hear something?” Lillie asked.
“I think I hear a kid crying,” one of the men said. He gave Lillie a wry smile.
“Open it up,” Lillie said.
The manager turned the key and walked back, the two Memphis patrol cops stepping up and pushing on inside with guns at the ready but below their waists. Quinn and Lillie followed, the lights cutting on, showing two unmade beds and piles of fast-food wrappers and pizza boxes, dirty linen and used diapers. The manager started into a roll of a language that Quinn didn’t know as he threw open the old curtains and tried to raise a window that looked as if it had been painted shut years ago.
Lillie walked into the bathroom and quickly came out, holding her breath. “Toilet’s backed up.”
The manager had kept the door open, and the sound of passing cars filled the little room. He was already on his cell phone, dog-cussing somebody about the shithole he’d found.