Chapter 2
2
I looked at the picture of Brady and Grady, taped to the dash of my truck. One was sitting in a red wagon wearing a cowboy hat. The other was pulling the wagon, wearing red cowboy boots.
I still couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that I was a twin. That my real name was Brady Beaumont and I’d been kidnapped by Arthur Beaumont when I was almost four-years-old. I’d looked at the newspaper files and Arthur Beaumont was the spitting image of Ronald Davies. So, even though I’d been kidnapped, I was still stuck claiming that son-of-a-bitch as my father. That really sucked.
Considering the fact that he hadn’t one paternal instinct in the world, why in the fuck had he taken me? I mean, he couldn’t put me to use on the fishing boat up in Alaska until I was ten. Of course he did have me cleaning the poor excuse of a house when I was five, and cooking for him when I was seven. At least I could do that when I wasn’t resting up from some beating or another.
It got better when I started working on his fishing boat. The guys didn’t like it when I was beat up, and they told him so. When five men came at dad at once to make their opinion known, Dad cut it out.
So instead of growing up in Tennessee with a mother and a brother, there was me at ten years old starting on my dad’s skiff, and all those cold weeks we would spend out on the Bering Sea during crabbing season. Dad would pilot his skiff like he was Captain fucking Ahab, and me, Kenny, Lucky, Barry, Ed and Shil would take all the shit he could hand out as we’d bait the eight-hundred-pound crab traps and toss them over the side of the boat, praying that we’d get a good haul of King Crabs. Not just so the five guys would get paid, but so Ronald Davies wouldn’t lose his shit.
I don’t know how many prayers were said on that boat as the winch would pull up a trap, but I bet between the six of us, we prayed more than they did at St. Michaels down in Dillingham.
When crabbing season was over, he’d drop me off at Aunt Meg’s every so often. She home-schooled my younger cousins. I remember badgering my aunt to tell me stories about my mom, but Aunt Meg was tightlipped. The two times I asked Dad about my mom, Dad lost his shit. Losing his shit was Dad’s first gear position. Second gear was torches and pitchforks, third gear was grizzly bear mean and abusive.
As for fourth gear, you just prayed you could outrun him and hide.
Three hundred and forty-six days after I turned seventeen and got my GED I used the little money I had to buy a one-way ticket to Anchorage. Lucky had a friend of his waiting for me at the Elmendorf-Richardson base, and he took me over to the recruitment office. So I signed up then and there, to the branch that Lucky had served in.
Three years ago, I took leave from my team when Aunt Meg died. My younger cousin Sheila and I were going through her things, and that’s when I found this picture. When I asked Dad about it, he acted skittish. Then he said they were kids Meg used to babysit for. When I asked him when she had lived in Tennessee, he’d lost his shit.
Of course.
He tried his normal moves, and I just smiled. I crossed my arms over my chest and stood there while he ranted and raved.
I perused my boyhood home again while I waited for him to wear himself out. The living room was a shambles. Two lamps didn’t even have lampshades, just lonely lightbulbs casting light on the cheap wood paneling falling off the walls. Back when we’d lived there together, I’d done my best to keep it clean. Now the ashtrays overflowed, empty beer cans lay all over the green shag rug, and when I’d looked earlier, I’d noted that some dishes in the sink actually had mold growing in them.
I turned back to him. “Are you done?”
“Don’t take that tone with me, boy. I brought you into this world, I can take you out.”
Another overused Ronald Davies line.
I didn’t bother to respond. “I’ve dreamt of this boy,” I said as I pointed to the kid in the wagon. “I’ve dreamt of those red cowboy boots. Am I one of these kids?”
He lunged for my hand. Ronald was my height and our builds were similar, but too much beer and too many cigarettes had made him soft. Meanwhile, I trained almost every day. I’d had enough. I easily knocked him back.
“Old Man, this picture is mine. Now answer the goddamned question,” I roared.
He didn’t like me pushing him back. He got that shitty, shifty expression on his face. “I told you. I don’t know who they are. I’ve never seen them before. But maybe I can find out for you.”
The old man was lying through his cracked yellow teeth.
“How?”
“You know how youse always jabbering away about your mom? Well, I seem to remember her having some people in Tennessee. Maybe I can?—”
A piece of wood paneling fell off the wall when I threw the old man against it. I shoved my forearm under his neck. “Don’t you tell me some garbage that you think I want to hear. You fucking tell me the truth. Where is my mom?”
On my birth certificate, she was Rose McDonald. That was written in the spot for maiden name, and married name was Rose Davies. Her age was nineteen, and her place of birth was noted as Dillingham, Alaska, which was a downright lie. Not one person in this tiny little town ever heard of a Rose McDonald. I knew that. I got my hands on my birth certificate when I’d realized I wanted to join the service. I’d found it on Ronald’s boat in a footlocker.
“I told you; I heard her say once that she had people in Tennessee.”
“Why the lie on the birth certificate? Why did she write down she was born in Dillingham?” I demanded to know.
“She didn’t know how to read or write. I put it in there. She said she was from all over down south. Her daddy had been in the Army. It was just easier to put down Dillingham.”
“Where is she now?”
“Just how in the hell should I know? I told you when you was eighteen. She done robbed me blind and took off. Took all the money from one week’s haul. Couldn’t pay my crew.”
“And why would she have done that?”
“Probably chasing after some man. She was a hussy. Took a plane right out of town. Found out she took a flight from Anchorage to Seattle. Don’t know what happened to her after that.”
I closed my eyes. Why did I even bother? Ronald Davies never once paid his crew fairly. It got to where Lucky would have to go with him to watch the catch being weighed and the money being paid out every time we unloaded at Dutch Harbor.
That was the last lie I allowed my father to tell me. When my leave ended, I went back to base and didn’t call or write to him again. But I kept that photo in my wallet, determined that one day I would get to the bottom of this mystery.
So here I am. Pushed out of Delta Force because of a catastrophic injury that damn near caused me not to walk again. But to hear my team tell it, I had angels standing in front of me, deflecting two sniper bullets and most of the concrete shards flying all around me. My team were sure I was destined to die that night. I didn’t, but it sure felt like I lost my real family, my team, when I had to leave Delta. Now, here I was tracking down a vague memory that would probably come to nothing.
I pulled off Hwy 321 toward Jasper Creek. I kept it at the speed limit; no point in tempting small town cops to rake in some additional revenue by charging me with a speeding ticket. My car navigation system told me I’d just passed over into Jasper Creek proper when I saw a sign that tickled me. It was a fifties-style waitress in a pink-and-white striped uniform, bending down at the waist holding a tray with a burger, fries, and a shake. My mouth watered. Time for some food. Maybe I could ask some questions. It was a small town. Maybe somebody would know something.
When I pulled up in my new-to-me GMC Canyon that I’d bought three days ago in Nashville, I was pleased to see that the parking lot was full. That always boded well for good food. When I got inside, the hostess said there’d be a twenty-minute wait. I didn’t mind. Gave me a minute to check the news. I wanted to see what was going on in the different hot spots in the world. See where my team might be deployed.
Shit.
Fourteen aid workers had been taken in Sierra Leone. Three Americans. Last I heard, my team was now in the Middle East, and the SEAL Teams were in Africa. Still, what a clusterfuck. The aid workers had only taken four UN Peacekeepers with them.
What the hell?
I swiped over to World of Tanks . At least that game made sense.
“Kay, your table is ready.”
“Kay, party of one, your table is ready.”
I finally looked up. What with the thick Southern accent and the hostess calling out a lady’s name, I didn’t realize she was calling my name. I stood up and smiled down at her. She looked up at me.
“I should have remembered you,” she murmured. “You’re definitely all-man.”
She was very pretty, and very interested, but I wasn’t interested in hooking up. Then there was the fact she looked like she was in high school, which did absolutely nothing for me. The only thing I was interested in was answers.
Still, I smiled. I’d learned fast in Nashville that down here; the style was friendly on steroids. Hell, just running into that Blessing lady kind of gave me a taste of the Southern way. I needed to fit in, so smiling needed to be my go-to. Up in Alaska, your neighbor wasn’t just your neighbor, they were your lifeline. But this smiling and treating everybody like your friend thing, wasn’t how I grew up. Add my father into the mix, and this was pretty damned foreign. I might have been stationed in North Carolina, but I was mostly out of the country.
“You said you were good to sit up at the counter, right?”
I nodded.
“I have a spot between the sheriff and Harvey.”
I almost laughed. She said that like I should know who those two men were. “Sounds good,” I muttered.
“Menus are at the counter. Don’t forget to get yourself a piece of pie. The peaches, pears and apples are grown at Millie’s.” She pointed to an empty seat at the counter, and I made my way there.
The man who looked up when I sat down was eating a salad. The one who kept eating had a mountain of a meal in front of him. I had no idea what it was, except it was covered in gravy. The salad-eater nodded to me as I grabbed a menu. Then he went back to his salad. I’d had the menu in my hand for less than a minute when a middle-aged woman with a beehive hairdo and bright red lipstick stepped in front of me.
“Coffee?” she asked as she held a pot.
“Yes, ma’am.”
She flipped over the ceramic mug and poured like she’d been doing it for years. “Are you Pearl?” I asked.
“The one and only,” she said proudly. “Pearl Bannister. What’s your name?”
“Kai Davies.”
“Pleased to meet you, Kai Davies. Your name doesn’t sound familiar, but your face is. Have you been through Jasper Creek before?”
I could feel the salad-eater listening to our conversation. I thought he must be the sheriff.
“Nope, this is my first time in Tennessee. My dad told me I might have relatives around here on my mother’s side. I thought I would check that out.”
“What’s her name?”
“Rose McDonald.”
“Doesn’t sound familiar.” She turned to the salad-eater. “What about you, Nash? Do you know any McDonalds with a girl named Rose who’d be old enough to have birthed Kai?”
Nash looked up, his lip twitching. “Can’t say that I do.”
Pearl shrugged her shoulders. “Sorry, son. Doesn’t sound like we can be of much help. You might want to talk to Little Grandma. She’s older than dirt. Knows everybody. She might be able to help you.”
“Where can I find her?”
“Down Home Café. You can’t miss it. It’s right on the town square. She works the breakfast and lunch shifts.”
“Thank you.” I smiled.
“I’ll leave you to study the menu.” She smiled back at me.
“You don’t have to leave. The sign outside decided me. I’ll take a bacon cheeseburger, rare, with American cheese and grilled onions, strawberry shake, and fries. Apparently, I’m supposed to order pie for dessert.”
Nash spoke up. “That’s mandatory.”
The guy to my left stopped shoveling his food for a moment. “You can never go wrong with pie.”
“I’m sold.”
“Your food will be right up,” Pearl promised.