approach matters to some people. I know that. This was as poorly presented and demeaning as the woman in Ozark Art.”
“I wouldn’t go that far. And I hoped you’d reconsider at some point.”
“I wasn’t going to, then … I was nervous, and I mishandled it.”
“Nervous?”
“This isn’t how I usually … I don’t know how to explain.”
“Not without telling me more than you want to. All right. Let’s try this. We’ll finish this glass of wine, and you’ll show me the greenhouse. We’ll see how things go from there.”
“I’m not good with seeing how things go.”
“I’m real good at it. Let’s give it a try. If you don’t like how they go, we can always do things your way. I figure I can’t lose.”
“You mean you’d have sex either way.”
He laughed again, reached out and took her hand for a squeeze. “What a woman. Let’s just see—damn it.” He broke off when his cell phone rang. “Hold that thought. Yeah, Ash, what’s the problem?”
She saw his face change as he listened, saw it go quiet and a little hard. “No, you did right. I’m on my way. You wait, you hear? Wait until I get there.
“I’m sorry,” he said to Abigail as he closed the phone.
“It’s all right.” But she didn’t look at him as she rose to pick up the plates.
“This kind of thing is part of the package,” he began.
“I understand that, of course. But you’re off duty.”
“So I must be using it as an excuse? No.” Gently, he laid a hand on her arm. “No, Abigail. This particular problem is one I ordered whoever got the call on it—which was inevitable—to contact me. On or off duty. I need to handle this situation.”
“I see. I do understand.”
“I’d like to come back.”
“You don’t have to feel—”
“Abigail, I’d like to come back, if I can. If I can’t, I’ll call you. I’m not sure which it’s going to be.”
“Because you have to see how it goes.”
“That’s exactly right. I have to go.” He leaned down, kissed her. “I’d rather stay.”
She believed him, and the belief warmed something inside her as he strode off the porch and around the house toward his car.
So tonight, the job sucked, Brooks thought, as he drove toward Tybal and Missy Crew’s. But he’d given this situation considerable thought since the last time Ty had drunk himself mean. Tonight, one way or another, Brooks intended to fix it.
Every window in the Crews’ House glowed up like Christmas, while neighbors gathered on the lawns as if the domestic disturbance qualified as a party. Ash kept them back from the house where bluegrass blasted through the wide-open door and the occasional crash rang out.
As Brooks got out of his car, Jill Harris—house on the left—walked over.
“Somebody’s got to go in there before he wrecks what’s left of that place.”
“Is Missy in there?”
“She ran out, barefoot, crying, her mouth bleeding. I can’t keep making these calls if nothing’s going to be done about it.”
“Will you file a complaint?”
“I have to live next door.” At five-foot-nothing, Jill folded her arms across her pink cardigan. “I tried talking to Missy about it once, while she sat in my kitchen holding a bag of my frozen peas to her black eye. She ended up calling me a dried-up old bitch who couldn’t mind her own business. Now she doesn’t speak to me. You think I want him banging on my door one drunken night?”
“All right, Ms. Harris. Come on, Ash.”
“Do you want to send someone out to find Missy?”
“No. She’s around here somewhere, or she hightailed it over to her sister’s. She knows we’ll respond.”
Part of him wondered if she’d come to enjoy the drama of it all, and he didn’t like the wondering.
“She’ll wait for us to haul him off,” Brooks continued, “then she’ll come back home, wait till morning to come tell us she slipped on the soap or some shit. I want you to stand by, but don’t talk to him. I don’t want you to say anything.”
“I can do that.”
Brooks didn’t have to knock, as Missy had left the door wide open when she fled. He stayed on the stoop, called out.
“I don’t know as he can hear,” Ash began.
“He’ll hear. We’re not going inside. We’re staying out here, where we’ve got better than a dozen witnesses.”
“To what?”
“To what happens next. Ty! You got company at the door.”
“I’m busy!” Brooks watched a lamp fly across the living room. “I’m redecorating.”
“I see that. Need a minute of your time.”
“Come on in, then. Join the fuckin’ party!”
“I come in there, I’m hauling you to jail. If you come out here, we’ll just have us a conversation.”
“Chrissake. Can’t a man get some chores done in his own home?” Ty stumbled to the door, big, glassy-eyed, blood pockmarking his face where Brooks assumed flying glass had nicked it. “Hey, there, Ash. Now, what can I do for you officers of the goddamn law tonight?”
“Looks like you’ve been sucking down that Rebel Yell pretty hard,” Brooks said, before Ash forgot himself and responded.
“No law against it. I’m in my own home sweet fucking home. I ain’t driving. I ain’t operating heavy machinery.” He cracked himself up, had to bend over and wheeze as the laugh took his breath away.
“Where’s Missy?”
“Hell if I know. I come home. There’s no supper on the table. But she had time to whine. Whine, whine, whine, nag, nag, nag. Where I been, what I been doing and who I’m doing it with.”
“Is that when you hit her?”
The glassy eyes went sly. “You know how clumsy she is. And when she’s on the whining and nagging she can’t see straight. Stupid bitch walked right into a door. Then she takes off.” He gestured, spotted the neighbors.
“Buncha assholes got nothing better to do than stand around outside. I’m in my house.” Ty pointed to his own feet to prove a point.
“Redecorating.”
“That is
“Maybe if you spent less time redecorating and more time fucking your wife, she wouldn’t walk into walls and take off.”
“I’m gonna get me some paint and … What’d you say?”
“You heard me.” Beside him, Ash goggled, but Brooks kept his eyes trained on Tybal. “I guess you can’t get that pea-shooter you call a dick up anymore.”
Ty swayed back and forth on his size-fourteen boots, blinked his bloodshot eyes. “You better shut your fucking mouth.”
“Then again, when you’re equipped with a cock the size of a gherkin, what’s the point in trying to get some wood?”
“Get off my property, you fucker.” Ty shoved him, and that was enough. But Brooks wanted to nail it shut.
“That the best you got?” Brooks put a sneer on his face. “I guess it figures a dickless wonder does the pushy shove like a girl. Next thing, you’ll be pulling my hair and crying.”
Though he was prepared for the punch and Ty was teetering drunk, it still carried some weight. Brooks
