“You were about to ruin his face” was the last thing Keeley heard.
KEELEY ROLLED OVER on the floor and opened his eyes at four-thirty in the morning. Predawn light, muted by the storm, fused through the door and the front windows.
He was freezing. His cheek where his head had been turned was wet with both rainwater from the open front door and blood from the dining room.
He managed to sit back on his haunches. Everything hurt, including his brains. He stood, and the events of the night before came rushing back.
Hank’s body was gone.
Arlen had screwed him over.
The Scarlett family was even sicker than he’d originally thought.
But there was no going back now. No way to undo what he’d done, and what happened afterward.
Keeley formed a plan. It came easily, and the simplicity of it stunned him. There was a way to get back at Arlen and Joe Pickett in one fell swoop.
It was still raining.
26
JOE GOT UP EARLY ENOUGH TO CONSCIOUSLY AVOID running into Missy in her kitchen, made coffee, showered, and was pulling on his uniform shirt when Marybeth said, “Joe . . . should you be wearing that?”
He stopped, puzzled at what she meant for a moment, then remembered he had been fired. He had no right to wear the uniform anymore. But he didn’t
“This is going to take awhile to get used to,” Joe said, stripping the shirt off and replacing it with a baggy University of Wyoming hooded sweatshirt.
He said, “What in the hell am I going to do today? Why in the hell didn’t I just sleep in or something?”
Marybeth didn’t have an answer to that.
AFTER RETURNING FROM Nate’s house the previous night in the rain, Joe and Marybeth had sat down with Sheridan and Lucy and told them he’d been fired.
Their questions were practical, if somewhat uncomprehending:
Lucy asked if it meant that she would no longer have to go to school.
Sheridan asked if it meant they could get a new vehicle to replace the lousy old Game and Fish truck.
Lucy asked the toughest question of all: “Does this mean we’ll be safer? That we can move back to our old house now?”
Joe and Marybeth exchanged glances. Marybeth said, “We’re going to be staying here for a while, Lucy. Our old house doesn’t really belong to us. It never did. And as for being safer, I suppose so. Right, Joe?”
Joe said, “Yup.” But he had no idea. Whoever had been targeting them might stop now, but then again . . .
“I like our old house,” Lucy said, starting to cry and tear Joe’s heart out. “I’ll miss our old house . . .”
Sheridan studied Joe’s face for a long time, saying nothing. Joe wished she would stop. She understood better than he’d expected how devastating it was to him, how doing the thing he loved had been taken away. He doubted she thought much further than that yet. But he was somewhat reassured by the fact that her demeanor reflected concern for his feelings, not what it would mean for the family. Yet.
IN BED, JOE had told Marybeth about finding Nate. He watched her reaction carefully, and she knew he was doing exactly that.
“And how was he?” she asked.
“Naked as a jaybird,” Joe said.
“You know what I mean. Was he doing all right? Is he just passing through, or what?”
“We didn’t really discuss it. I suggested he put on some clothes and he did. I don’t know why he goes around naked all the time. He thanked me for keeping his birds fed. I told him there were a lot of people looking for him, starting with the FBI. Then I left.”
Marybeth wanted to ask a million questions, it was obvious, and Joe really didn’t want to answer any of them. He was tired, and beaten down. Nate was a subject he didn’t have any energy for. Plus, he was unemployed.
“I don’t understand men sometimes,” she said. “How could you see a friend you haven’t seen in half a year—a man you’ve been through hell with on more than one occasion—and just say hello and go home?”
Joe shrugged. “It was pretty easy.”
“Where has he been all of this time?”
“He didn’t say.”
Marybeth shook her head in disbelief.
“If you’re wondering if he asked about you, he didn’t,” Joe said, turning away from her in bed.
