“In my pocket…two twenty dollar bills and a five.”
“Okay.”
“Can you give them to that man there?”
“Cobb?”
“Yes.”
I resist the urge to ask him why he didn’t just get Cobb to take it himself.
“Not much life in you,” Hill says, dropping to his haunches. “Better start talking. Just because you die doesn’t mean I can’t reach you.”
Brody swallows, looks at Cobb, then away. “She came out of nowhere.”
Cobb takes a step forward, but is stopped by the Reverend’s glare and Wintry’s hand on his shoulder. “What’s he talkin’ about?”
“Your wife, I expect,” Hill says, with no emotion at all, then reaches forward and tilts the kid’s head up until their eyes meet. “Am I right?”
“We didn’t see her. She must have had her lights off. And if you don’t get your fucking hand off me, Preacher, I swear I’ll use every last ounce of my strength…to put you through the wall.”
As I’m listening, I picture Eleanor Cobb, hunched over her steering wheel, trying to look as small and inconspicuous as possible, afraid of being seen by anyone, even in the storm, lights turned off on a quiet road because she doesn’t imagine she’ll encounter another car, and doesn’t want to draw attention to herself if she does. But she hasn’t counted on a thief and his woman traveling on that same quiet road, pedal to the metal, eager to be clear of a town that reeks of death.
I lower my head. “Jesus.”
“Hang on, kid,” Cobb says, and his tone is both desperate and disbelieving. “You must be mistaken. She doesn’t come to get me. She never does.”
“She did tonight,” Hill says.
“No.”
“I took her wallet. Figured…with the state she was in…she wouldn’t need it. Saw her name…I’m sorry…you can have the money…I’m—”
I look up in time to see Cobb lunging for the kid, but Wintry’s got him in a firm hold, and all Cobb can do is struggle until the strength leaves him and he turns, embraces the big black man and weeps uncontrollably.
“Get him a drink and sit him down,” I tell Wintry, and he does. I’m surprised anyone is listening to me. On nights as wild as these, badges count for nothing.
All the fight has left Cobb.
Reverend Hill stands up and scratches his chin. He sighs heavily. “Sheriff,” he says. “Looks like you and I have a bit of a problem.”
Chapter Four
Considering the amount of blood on the chair and the floor beneath him, I don’t reckon the kid has much time left. His face is the color of fresh snow and he’s propped up against the bar like a guy who’s had too much to drink and is trying to remember where the hell he’s found himself. And, aside from the drink part, maybe that’s exactly what he’s doing.
The girl on the bar turns her head. Her tears are silent. Seems all the fight has left her too. She closes her eyes, jerking occasionally and gasping as Flo and Gracie tend to her. “She’s goin’ to die if we don’t do somethin’,” Flo informs me, and it’s hardly a revelation, but the one man willing to do something is way past doing it now. It’s not like I can waltz up to Cobb and ask him to mend the people who killed his wife. That’s the saddest part of all. I doubt he’d have been all that worried if his gift allowed him to raise the dead. But it doesn’t. He can heal, that’s it, and only wounds, not diseases. And right now, I’m willing to bet Cobb’s second-guessing the limits of his power, wondering if it might work on his wife.
The priest turns to look at me. “You’ve got a job to do, Sheriff. Lucky for you, there’ll soon be one less victim to worry about. Your boy gets that one. It’s almost poetic, isn’t it?”
“What is it you want me to do, exactly?”
“You gonna just let me die?” Brody croaks. “I knew there was a reason this town stank.”
The Reverend shrugs. “No more than you were planning on doing all along. I want you to get in your truck and drive through town, fast as that piece of shit can carry you.”
“Might want to watch the profanity there, Reverend. It being the mark of an ignorant man an all.”
“Just do your job.”
“For what? The kid’s dying and—”
“Quit saying that, wouldya?” Brody interrupts.
“—his girl’s bleeding out on the bar.”
“True…” Hill shows his teeth. “But dying means they aren’t dead
“Can’t you just let this one be?” Flo asks. “She’s with child, for God’s sake.”
Without glancing her way, Hill says, “As are you, but you wouldn’t expect anyone to forgive you
Flo doesn’t look shocked or stunned. She looks angry, and when she looks at Wintry, who is kneeling next to Cobb at the table where I first sat down, that anger turns to shame. Wintry, however, doesn’t look quite so impassive anymore. Sins, the threat of Hell, death and murder don’t make him blink, but finding out he’s a Daddy sure does. His mouth is open, just a little, and I reckon even though he can’t talk, he’s saying something.
Thunder rolls like boulders across the roof.
Lightning shows me Cadaver in the corner, counting.
Me, I feel no more envy. Instead, I feel bolstered a little, aware that all those long-winded old passages you find in the bible about life and death and retribution may mean something after all. All we know, all we have known for as long as I can recall, is death. Now there’s life. Even if we can’t help poor Brody and Carla, even if we can’t save her baby, Flo is pregnant, and the significance of that single fact is so great it makes my head hurt and my heart beat a little faster. Flo, a creature of death, is carrying life. Untainted life. Life Reverend Hill, for all his threats and blustering, cannot reach. Yet.
Flo is pregnant.
And whether or not she ends up filling that empty vessel with hate, or sadness, or sin, right now, for me, it represents just the tiniest bit of hope.
It’s enough.
And it would seem I’m not alone in feeling that.
Without any of us, even the supposedly all-knowing Reverend, hearing his approach, Kyle is standing next to the priest, and the gun that has held so much meaning tonight, is gripped firmly in his hand again, the determination I’ve watched for three years back on his face, the muzzle nestled firmly against Hill’s temple.
“I’m not driving tonight,” I tell the priest, but Kyle has other ideas.
“Yes you are.”
I look at him, wondering if this is how he finally intends to rid himself of his long-dead father. A man, who, despite all the nightmares and all the people he’s killed on someone else’s behalf, only ever felt guilty for the death he didn’t cause. Cold as that sounds, I reckon there’s a lot of truth to it.
“Me and you and the Reverend are going to take a ride tonight,” Kyle says. “We’re going to take that girl with us, and we’re going to get her to Doctor Hendricks.”
The priest chuckles. “Is that so?”
“Shit,” Brody intones, struggling to sit up straighter. “What about me?”
He is ignored. We’re not going to abandon him. That much I know. Not if there’s a chance to save him. But Kyle’s calling the shots now, so we’re going to play it his way for the time being. The girl looks a lot worse off, so she goes first, is what I’m guessing is Kyle’s reasoning here, though it would be just as easy to take them both.
