Chapter Eleven
Wade didn’t expect another day of reprieve from Sheriff Nava, and he didn’t get one.
As soon as Wade entered his office, the sheriff was hot on his heels. Wade settled behind his desk and waited for the boss to speak. Nava loomed large in the open doorway, his face devoid of expression.
“Solve any murders yesterday?” Nava asked.
“No, sir.”
“What’s the status on the coroner’s report?”
Wade drummed his fingertips on the desk. “Undetermined, but with suspicious circumstances.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I’m in the process of eliminating names from missing person lists.”
“Statewide?”
“Yes.”
“Good luck with that,” Nava said in a flat voice. “In the meantime, we have active cases to investigate. Actual crimes. Not suspected.”
“I understand that.”
“Have you reviewed the files?”
“I have not.”
Nava forged ahead with a rapid-fire set of demands that required Wade’s immediate attention.
There had been an armed robbery overnight, someone needed to supervise the water tower removal in Rocksprings, and Wade had to attend an interagency meeting about criminal activity during a disaster response.
Wade opened a blank document to type dictation notes. He didn’t want to be accused of shirking any duties.
“You got all that?”
“Yep.”
Nava left as abruptly as he’d come in, and Wade went straight to work.
He wouldn’t be investigating any old bones today.
He was in and out of the office all day, moving from one task to another.
It was well past quitting time when he got a call from Jackson Nava.
Wade had been about to leave the station, but he answered anyway.
“Hendricks.”
“It’s Jackson. I just stopped in at the Crazy Horse to interview Elvira Franklin.”
“How did it go?”
“I’m actually calling because I saw your mother inside the bar, and now she’s getting behind the wheel.”
“My mother is driving?”
“It appears that way, yes. She’s got a friend with her who can hardly walk.”
“Describe the friend.”
“Pretty brunette, midtwenties.”
Wade cursed under his breath. Mary was drunk with his mother. Too drunk to drive, which was her job. He expected this kind of behavior from Wynona, not Mary. It felt like a betrayal, even though he had no claim on her.
“How do you want me to proceed?” Jackson asked.
“Follow her. If she makes a violation, pull her over. I’m on my way there.”
“Ten-four.”
Wade stayed on the phone with Jackson as he left the station in a rush. His mother didn’t need another DUI, but he was more concerned about a serious accident. His mind raced with possibilities, including a head-on collision. Maybe he should advise Jackson to do a sobriety check and avert disaster.
“She’s driving slow and steady,” Jackson said.
Wade exceeded the speed limit to reach the area.
He spotted his mother’s green Subaru at the traffic light, turning left on Rocksprings Road.
She appeared to be heading home. Jackson’s squad car followed at a discreet distance.
Wade pulled into the queue behind him. His heart rate eased with every mile gained.
“I’ll take it from here,” Wade said. “Thanks for the heads-up.”
“No problem.”
Wade ended the call and tossed his phone aside.
He watched as Jackson diverted to a side street and left him to it.
Wade’s concern for his mother, which had faded into relief, transformed again into anger.
He couldn’t believe she was driving without a license.
Mary deserved to be fired for failure of duties.
As soon as they arrived at Nolan Ranch, Wade exited his vehicle. He came in hot, storming toward his mother’s Subaru.
Wynona whirled to face him, hands on her hips. “Did you send a deputy to follow me?”
Wade could tell she’d had a few drinks.
He ignored her question and posed his own. “Why are you drinking and driving?”
“Who says I was drinking?”
“I do. You’re lucky you didn’t get arrested again.”
“You are so overdramatic,” she said. “I’m not even drunk.”
He wrenched open the passenger door to yell at Mary, who might actually listen to him. What he found gave him pause. Mary was slumped in the seat, eyes closed. When he shook her shoulder, she didn’t rouse.
“Leave her alone,” Wynona said.
“What’s wrong with her?”
“Nothing. She’s just resting.”
Wade didn’t believe that for a minute, so he checked her vital signs. Her pulse rate was normal. She was breathing steadily. He noted that she didn’t smell like alcohol, though he detected the faint hint of cherries on her lips.
“What’s she on?” he demanded.
Wynona peered in on Mary. “She’s not on anything. She’s fine.”
“She’s not fine, Mother! She’s unresponsive.”
“You don’t have to shout.”
“Tell me what the fuck she’s on, or I’m taking her to the ER to get her stomach pumped, and you’re coming with me!”
Flinching at his furious roar, she removed a plastic container from her purse and handed it to him. Wade recognized the pills inside as a strong narcotic with a high street value. “She had really bad cramps.”
“Jesus Christ, Mom. These would put a horse out.”
“I only gave her one.”
“How much did she drink?”
“Not a drop. She doesn’t drink.”
“I’ve seen her drinking with you before.”
“No, you haven’t. She’s always sober.”
“She’s literally high as a kite right now.”
“It’s not what you think. She has a prescription in her room. I didn’t give her anything she doesn’t already take.”
Wade stomped into the house and went straight into Mary’s room.
He rifled through her dresser drawers until he found a single container.
She did have a prescription for painkillers.
There were three pills left in the bottle.
He took it outside, shaking with anger. “This prescription is for 5 milligrams. You gave her 20.”
“Well,” she said, huffing. “My mistake.”
Wade cursed some more, pacing the driveway.
He shoved the bottle in his pocket. Instead of grilling his mother about her life choices, he checked on Mary again.
She mumbled something about wanting to sleep.
He lifted her from the passenger seat and carried her inside.
She was alert enough to twine her arms around his neck and cling to him.
Instead of taking her to her room, he deposited her on the couch.
It would be easier to keep an eye on her out here.
She didn’t release her grip on him when he set her down.
“Stay with me, Wade. Don’t let go.”
Wade disentangled her arms from his neck, which flushed with heat. Her words were soft and barely coherent, but the sensual tone was clear enough. His mother, who was standing nearby, raised an eyebrow.
“I like you,” Mary murmured. “You’re not like him.”
He hushed her gently, ignoring his mother’s knowing smirk. Mary’s chest rose and fell with even breaths. She was wearing a red dress that hugged her curves and left her pretty shoulders bare.
“You’re not like him,” she said, and fell asleep again.
Wade watched her for several moments, his chest aching.
His mother walked into the kitchen, and Chico came into the living room to investigate.
After he sniffed Mary’s outstretched hand, he settled in beside her and rested his head on her thigh.
Wade could hear his mother in the kitchen, mixing another drink for herself.
He took a deep breath before he joined her.
His first instinct was to criticize her reckless and irresponsible behavior.
He curbed it.
“Was her husband abusive?” he asked.
“Aren’t they all?” Wynona replied.
Wade didn’t appreciate her flip answer, but he tried not to take it personally. It wouldn’t help to get defensive, or to argue that most men were not, in fact, abusive. An awful thought occurred to him. “Was Dad?”
She took a bracing drink before she responded. “Not in front of you or Billy, and never with a closed fist.”
Wade stared at her in silent shock. Obviously, she was telling the truth, and it floored him. “I didn’t know.”
Her eyes softened. “Of course you didn’t.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Would it have made a difference?”
Wade wrestled with the question. She was asking if he would have chosen to live with her after the divorce, had he known what kind of man his father was.
He didn’t want to answer, because he wasn’t sure he would have.
There were many types of abuse, and his father hadn’t laid a hand on him.
Her neglect, however, had made a deep impact.
“Why did you marry him?” he asked.
She sank into a kitchen chair with her cocktail. “I was eighteen and pregnant with you. My choices were limited.”
“You weren’t planning to go to college?”
“No. I was never good at school.”
“Like Billy?”
She paused to consider. “We both had attention issues. He was disruptive. I daydreamed.”
Wade hung up his hat and sat down across from her. His mind circled around the issue of capable parenting. “Do you remember when I broke my arm?”
“Yes.”
“I fell off my bike doing some stupid stunt in the street. Mike made a sling out of his shirt for me and walked me home.”
Her lips formed a sad smile at the mention of Mike.
“When we got there, Dad was still at work. You were inside with Billy. I sat down on the front porch and waited over an hour for Dad to come home. I didn’t trust you to drive me to the hospital.”
The sad smile turned into a thin, hard line. She drank her cocktail with a defiant slosh of liquid and ice.
“I’m sorry I chose to live with Dad instead of you,” he said. “I was just a kid. I needed a reliable parent.”
“You never respected me.”
“I was ten years old, Mom.”
“He poisoned you against me.”
Wade raked a hand through his hair. “I’m not on his side anymore. I’m here because I want you in my life.”
She gripped her tumbler with a white-knuckled hand. Her hands showed her age more than her face.
“You don’t want me in your life,” she said. “You want me to stop embarrassing you with my messy problems. You want to say you tried to save me so you can feel like a hero before you walk away.”