really did know where he was hiding? What the hell would I tell them then?
“You’re putting the young man in a tight spot here,” said Charley Stevens.
“We realize that,” said Soctomah. “But what’s the alternative? The longer his dad is on the run, the more likely it becomes that he-or somebody else-gets hurt. Do you want that on your conscience, Mike? Or are you willing to step up here and help us resolve this situation today?”
“I’ll talk to her,” I said, as if I weren’t desperate to do so, anyway.
We descended a flight of warped wooden stairs and then passed through a darkened hallway lit only by a glowing red EXIT sign. My buddy, Deputy Twombley, was standing outside a door at the end. When he saw me, his lips pulled back from his teeth like a chimp mimicking a human smile.
“How’s she doing?” Soctomah asked him.
“She keeps bitching about going to Rum Pond.”
The door opened, and at first I thought no one was there. Then I saw a barefoot young woman sitting on the floor with her back against the wall and her knees drawn up in front of her. Her face was dark-eyed and angular, all cheekbones and jawline, and she was wearing blue jeans and a sleeveless top that showed her lean, brown arms. A pair of work boots lay on the floorboards beside three cans of Diet Pepsi.
“Mike?” she said.
“B.J.?”
I felt like I’d been sucker punched. The last time I’d seen Truman Dellis’s daughter she’d been a shy little twelve-year-old chopping carrots for soup in the kitchen at Rum Pond. Now she was a woman, and an attractive one, too.
“I didn’t know your name was Brenda,” I stammered.
“Brenda Jo.” I could see she had just been crying. “Who were you expecting?”
Soctomah loomed over my shoulder. “What’s going on, Mike? You said you didn’t know her.”
“We worked in the kitchen together at Rum Pond when we were kids. I thought her last name was Dellis.”
She rose to her feet, pushing against the wall to get there. “That’s my old man’s name. I use my mom’s.”
Suddenly I made the connection. “You’re my dad’s girlfriend?”
She lowered her eyes and nodded yes.
How old was she now? Twenty? Twenty-one? I’d seen my father charm some younger women, but none as young as this. The idea made me queasy. “He never told me.”
“So you two have a history after all,” said Menario, not even bothering to hide his animosity. In his mind we were all covering up for a murderer.
Brenda glared up at the detectives with tear-reddened eyes. “This is a pretty cute trick. I should’ve figured a ride home from jail was too good to be true.” She raised her chin in Soctomah’s direction. “You jerks are still going to bring me to Rum Pond, right?”
“That’s what we agreed,” said Soctomah.
“We’ll leave you two to get reacquainted,” said Menario.
When he closed the door, it seemed to suck all the air out of the room. I heard muffled conversation from the hall, a harsh laugh, then echoing footsteps moving away.
There was a single, cobwebbed window at ground level, above her head. It let in a little dusty light that left most of the room in shadows. There were filing cabinets and bookshelves with heavy ancient volumes gathering dust. Brenda and I studied each other.
“So I guess they haven’t found Jack yet,” she said.
“Why do you say that?”
“You wouldn’t be here otherwise.” She gave me a smile that was more sad than happy. Her front teeth were slightly crooked. “I can’t believe you didn’t know who I was. That’s pretty funny.”
“Hilarious,” I said. “When did you stop using ‘B.J.’?”
“When I figured out why men liked saying it so much.”
That made sense. I’d heard more dirty jokes at Rum Pond than anywhere else in my life. “So now it’s Brenda.”
“It’s always been Brenda. My mother never called me B.J. It was my old man who started that.”
I pictured Truman Dellis’s pie-dough face, eyes that went from dopey to dangerous in a heartbeat. “How is Truman?”
She ignored the question. “You don’t have a cigarette, do you?”
“I don’t smoke. Soctomah said you had something to tell me.”
She started to tear up again. “This is all so fucked up. First, Jack being accused of killing those guys, and then the cops coming after me. They put me in jail, and I didn’t even do anything. I never heard of a material witness before.”
“They can’t hold you anymore,” I said. “Not without evidence.”
“So what am I doing here?”
“They were just delaying you until I arrived. They thought if we spoke it might clear some things up. That’s why I’m here. It’s the best way to help yourself-and my dad.”
She rubbed the back of her neck and glanced longingly at the dirty window. “Can’t we talk outside? It’s like an oven in here.”
“We can talk here.”
“They probably got this room bugged.”
“It’s not bugged, B.J.”
“Brenda!” For an instant her face was contorted with anger, and then, just as quickly, became mild again.
“I’m sorry,” I said, ashamed at my own clumsiness. The truth was that I found the whole situation disorienting, the idea of this good-looking woman being the skinny girl I once knew, and the realization that she now shared a bed with my father. “It’s hot, and I’m tired and not thinking straight. Let’s just talk for a while, and then I’ll get you a ride back to Rum Pond.”
“So you’re on their side then?”
I almost laughed out loud at the absurdity of it all. She thought I was on the side of the cops, and the cops thought I was on my father’s side. In reality I was just the rope in a tug-of-war.
“It’s not funny,” she said. “You don’t care about him.”
“Of course I do. He’s my father.”
“Then why are you trying to help them catch him?”
“Because if I don’t, some cop is going to shoot him. As long as he’s on the run, he’s in danger. I’ve spent the past five days trying to protect him. As far I can tell, I’m the only person in the state who thinks he’s innocent.”
“He
“Do you have proof?”
“I was with him that night at Rum Pond. He wasn’t near Dead River or that meeting.”
“You already told the detectives that. They think you’re lying. They say they have evidence that puts him at the scene.”
“What evidence?”
I knew I probably shouldn’t tell her what Charley had confided in me, but I wanted to hear how she explained it. “Tire tracks from his pickup. And a boot print. There’s also the fact that he assaulted a police officer and is now a fugitive from justice.”
She reached down for the can of Diet Pepsi on the floor, pretending like she hadn’t heard me. “He had no reason to kill that paper company man.”
“Soctomah thinks he was pissed off. Wendigo was closing down Rum Pond Camps and kicking him out of his cabin. He wanted to scare them, make them think twice.”
“That’s stupid. He doesn’t give a shit about Rum Pond or that cabin.”
“Maybe someone put him up to it. Someone like Pelletier?”
“Jack wouldn’t piss on Russ Pelletier if he was on fire.”
This was news to me. Pelletier had been brusque at the funeral, but I figured he was just mad at me. “I thought they were friends.”
“Friends.” She said the word as if it carried a bad taste. “Where have you been?”
