When Sam was done I was holding my breath, Ozzie was holding Sam’s gaze and Dad was staring at Sam like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny popped in to give him a brand-new hunting rifle and a year-round permit to shoot all things cute and furry and a basket as big as a house filled with chocolate. In other words, like he’d just hit the mother lode.
The silence stretched so before I passed out, I decided to start breathing again.
Finally, Ozzie spoke.
“I’ll admit those leads are cold, Cooper, but they’re cold for us, they’ll be cold for you.”
“First, what’s cold for you is not cold for my boys and second, I’ll ask, you sure you got all you could get from that piece of shit’s bitch?”
Clearly knowing who Sam was referring to, Ozzie answered, “Vanessa was very forthcoming as advised by her attorney. She’s arguing that it was all Cooter’s idea and she was along for the ride, without collusion but with a fair amount of coercion, so I suspect her attorney wants to show she’s been helpful in order for it to assist her case.”
“Interesting to see if the woman who pawned a bunch of shit and conned her husband who she drove to committing murder into getting a second mortgage to pay for a hit can convince a jury of that bullshit but I don’t care about that. I asked if you’re sure you got all you could get from her,” Sam returned.
“And what I’m sayin’ is, yeah. She’s up the creek without a paddle. I reckon she thinks that’s her paddle,” Ozzie stated.
“Then you haven’t got all she could give you,” Sam declared.
“How you figure that?” Dad asked and Sam looked at him.
“Because she’s covering her ass. She was bein’ smart and doin’ the right thing, she’d come completely clean, cop to what she did, confess and use her tell-all as ammunition for a plea bargain. She’s hidin’ something,” Sam replied.
“You can’t know that, you haven’t even met her,” Ozzie told him.
“Have you found the broker?” Sam asked Ozzie.
Ozzie inclined and twisted his neck but didn’t answer. In other words, no.
“My guess, she or the piece of shit met with the broker, face-to-face,” Sam speculated.
“Yeah,” Ozzie confirmed. “She said Coot did but that guy’s in the wind too.”
“Bullshit,” Sam clipped. “His percentage is probably ten, at most twenty. He’s local. He does not evaporate after brokering a deal, he doesn’t make the kind of cake that lets him relocate like that especially seein’ as he’d need to activate or create a network of scum everywhere he relocates. He needs business. He’ll be reachable. We’ll reach him.”
“Vanessa told us he told Coot that he also doesn’t have contact with his men,” Ozzie informed Sam.
“Then either that bitch lied or the broker lied to her. If he doesn’t, he knows someone who does. He can hardly get them assignments without some form of contact,” Sam returned.
“We thought of that but we got a warrant for her computer and she gave us details and he’s unreachable. No one’s even heard of him,” Ozzie returned.
“Then she met with him personally and that’ll hurt her case so she’s hidin’ somethin’ from you. She’ll give it to me. And the way I’ll get it means either during or after your Department will get a call from her. If she tells you I’m there, your boys take their time showin’ up. If she calls after I’m gone, you cover my ass,” Sam demanded.
“You have got to know askin’ me to do that is not only unlawful, it’s insane.” Ozzie was getting heated.
“I get that you got a responsibility to all your citizens, including that bitch. I feel for you, that’s gotta tear you up. But straight up, I don’t give a shit about that either. You’ll cover my ass.” Sam was still cool as a cucumber.
“You need to stand down and let my boys handle this,” Ozzie snapped, at his end.
“And I’m tellin’ you, I’m not gonna do that,” Sam retorted.
“Then you’ll find trouble in this town,” Ozzie returned.
Sam was silent.
I waited.
Dad waited.
Ozzie waited.
Sam finally gave it to Ozzie.
“Seven years, you knew,” he said quietly.
Ozzie and Dad sucked in breath.
I held mine.
Sam wasn’t done.
“You, of all people, had a responsibility to her.”
“I –” Ozzie started but Sam cut him off, no longer cool, totally pissed.
“Don’t,” he bit off. “Do not. Do not stand in front of her and make excuses. Do not do it. Her friends, her parents, they were caught in his web, she was fragile, they had to be careful not to break her in trying to deal with that shit or tip him into making it worse. You have no excuse.”
“She never called it in, never made a report,” Ozzie said softly then his eyes came to me. “Darlin’, I’m sorry but –”
Sam cut him off. “That’s an excuse.”
Ozzie’s gaze sliced to Sam and he clipped, “You clearly do not understand the sometimes extremely frustrating limits of law enforcement.”
“Yeah, I do. But not for men who hunt with an abused woman’s father who’ve known that woman since she was a little girl. Men like that make shit happen so that shit stops,” Sam fired back.
It was time, I felt, for me to intervene and I did this by lifting both hands and wrapping my fingers around the arm Sam had around my chest, twisting my neck, tipping my head back to look at him and whispering, “Sam, honey, that’s not fair.”
Sam looked down at me. “Did you tell me you were contaminated?”
Another audible breath from my Dad.
I stared in Sam’s eyes, silent.
“Did you tell me that, baby?” Sam asked.
“I… yes,” I whispered.
“You’re terrified of me when I get angry. Not an adrenalin rush, you get the shakes. I see ‘em, it’s so fuckin’ bad.”
“Sam,” I was still whispering.
“First, a woman like you with a family and friends like yours, beauty like yours and a personality like yours should never feel like she’s contaminated. I do not know how that feels for you, baby, but I do know what your face looked like when you said it to me and I held you in my arms when you cried after you confessed that shit so I can guess and that is not right, that is not fair. And you jumpin’ straight to that kind of fear because you were trained to do so at the hands of your dead husband is also not fair.” Sam looked to Ozzie. “I know you’re a good man. I can see you warred with this for a long time. I can also see you carry a burden for the decision you made. So what you need to do now is stop makin’ decisions that cover your ass and start makin’ them to take care of Kia.”
“You don’t understand what you’re askin’ me to do,” Ozzie said quietly.
“I do and I’ll do my best to make sure nothin’ I do blows back on you. That said, shit happens and I’m focused on makin’ Kia safe so, if it does, you need to suck it up and think quick to cover my ass and yours.”
Ozzie stared at Sam and Sam held his stare.
Then Ozzie looked very briefly at me but he avoided Dad’s eyes before he looked back at Sam.
“You hurt Vanessa, I won’t cover for you.”
“I’d like to rip the bitch’s head off but that’s not how I work,” Sam replied.
Ozzie tipped up his chin then continued, “Whatever you get you also give to us.”
“Done,” Sam agreed.
“You track either the broker or his man down, you give them to us.”
Sam shook his head. “No fuckin’ way.”
“Then no deal,” Ozzie fired back.
“We get what we need from them; you can have ‘em. But not until we know shit is locked down and Kia is safe,” Sam returned.
Ozzie clenched his teeth. Then he nodded.
Then he added, “Heartmeadow is not the OK Corral. Your badasses do not have carte blanche to make it so. They see a threat, they call it in.
”
“They see a threat, they neutralize it then they call it in,” Sam countered.
“Jesus, Cooper!” Ozzie exploded, “How exactly do you think I can cover for your crew if a man who is not licensed to carry concealed in the State of Indiana or you, who’s in possession of two firearms for which you don’t have permits, drills holes into a suspected assailant before he becomes an assailant?”
“That is not my problem, it’s yours,” Sam stated. “And it’s the whole reason for this head’s up and why Essie is not in here right now learnin’ about what’s goin’ down with her daughter because she also has the right to know. What she doesn’t need is to be accessory to anything that might turn bad.”
Oh man.
That didn’t sound good.
“Would I be an accessory?” I asked.
“No,” Sam answered, tilting his head to look down at me.
“Dad?” I pushed.
“Don’t worry about it,” Sam replied, this time giving me the wrong answer.
“But –” I started.
“Don’t worry about it, Kia,” Dad stated and I looked at him.
“I –”
“I want to know,” Dad said firmly and looked at Ozzie. “I want to know everything from now on.” Dad looked at Sam. “Everything.”
Sam nodded immediately.
Ozzie looked to his feet.
“Oz?” Dad prompted.
Ozzie looked at Dad. “You know I was only trying –”
“No,” Dad shook his head. “We’ll deal with that later, after Kia’s safe. Right now, no more hiding anything. This is my daughter. I want to know.”
Ozzie held Dad’s eyes a moment before he nodded his head.
Dad looked at Sam. Then he looked at me.
Then he commenced in breaking my heart.
Tears forming in his eyes, he whispered an agonized, “I didn’t look out for you.”
I pushed against Sam’s arms when I saw his tears, heard the tortured tone of his voice but Sam’s arms locked tight.
Dad wasn’t done and I suspected this was because Sam felt this was my due and Dad’s responsibility to say it.
But I didn’t want him to.
“Dad,” I whispered, still pushing against Sam’s arms.
“We all let you down,” Dad told me. “Me especially.”
“Dad, don’t,” I begged quietly.
“You said things have come up for you, they’ve come up for me and your mother too. And bottom line, we let you down.”
“Stop,” I pleaded.
“I can’t,” he said brokenly.
“I didn’t ask for your help. I kept my secrets. I –”
Dad interrupted me. “You ask for Sam’s?”
My head jerked. “Wh… what?”
“You told me you made it hard on him and there he stands. And there he stood when he laid it out for Ozzie how it was gonna go down. Did you ask for that?” Dad asked.
“I…” I shook my head, “No.”
“He’s lookin’ out for you. I shoulda looked out for you.”
“Dad –”
“I gotta say it, Kiakee. I let you down. Your mother let you down.” He held my eyes and the tears trembled in his as he whispered, “You thought you were contaminated. My beautiful girl thought she was contaminated.” He stared at me and his voice broke when he finished, “I let you down.”
I tore out of Sam’s arms and ran across the room into my father’s.
He shoved his face in my neck and I felt his body jerk in my arms as he swallowed a sob which made one tear from my throat so I shoved my face in his neck and let loose.
I held him, he held me and then suddenly Dad’s head snapped up and he ordered in a thick voice, “No. You stay.”
I pulled my face out of his neck to look over my shoulder to see Ozzie moving through the doors to the dining room, shutting them behind him but Sam moving to the couch and sitting on its arm.
I looked at Dad and lifted my hands to both his cheeks.
Then I whispered, “Please don’t let him get his claws into you. I couldn’t bear that, Dad. It happened, it’s over, we deal with what we have to deal with now, we bury it where it belongs because he’s dead and we move on. I love you. I always did, I always will. We all made mistakes, including me. You didn’t let me down. I didn’t reach out so you could hold me up.”
“Hon, I understand you see it that way but I’m your father and I knew. You didn’t say it. We didn’t see it. But deep down inside I knew and I didn’t do anything. I couldn’t –”
“Really,” I interrupted him, “we don’t have to do this.”
His hands came up, fingers wrapping around my wrists and he pulled them down between us and shook them while he said, “Yes, Kia, we do.”
I closed my mouth.
Dad held my eyes.
“Your mother and me, we talked about it all the time. We couldn’t figure out if you loved him and put up with it because you did. Or if he’d broken you and you were showin’ a brave face. Missy talked to us, told us you were not ready to go there and we just needed to keep an eye on you and be there when you were ready. She said if we pushed, we might drive you closer to him and deeper into that mess. But it went against everything I was not to step in. I talked to Cooter least half a dozen –”
At his words I felt my body jerk.
“What?” I whispered, my eyes wide, shocked.
“I talked to Cooter.”
“You did?”
“Half a dozen times. First to feel him out. Then I laid it out.”
I took a step back and stared at him.
Then I asked, “Seriously?”
“Yeah.”
“You laid it out for Cooter?”
Dad nodded, studying me.
“What’d you say?”
“I said you were not my girl anymore, I didn’t know what was goin’ on but if what I suspected was goin’ on was actually goin’ on, if it didn’t stop, I’d stop it.”
I shook my head. “But… when did you do this?”
“Year ago,” Dad answered then finished, “Too late.”
“What did he say?”
“Gave me a bunch a’ shit about how he loves you, everything is good, you can get moody and you been tryin’ to get pregnant and it wasn’t happening so you were out of sorts.”
I blinked.
Then I asked, “What?”
“Honey, though I hope everything is all right in that department, God works in mysterious ways and maybe –”
“I wasn’t trying to get pregnant!” I said kind of loud.
“You weren’t?” Dad asked, looking perplexed again.
“Uh… no,” I threw out a hand. “I mean, seriously, the man beat me.” I powered through Dad’s flinch. “What kind of idiot would I be to have a kid with a guy like that?”
“Kiakee –” Dad started.
“He lied to you, point blank,” I informed Dad.
“Kia –”
I whirled then informed Sam of something he couldn’t miss seeing as I was being loud but also he was only three feet away, “Cooter lied bald-faced to my father.”
“Baby, seriously, you look pissed and surprised but this is that piece of shit you’re talkin’ about, how can you be surprised?” Sam asked.
“I don’t know but I am.” I threw up my hands. “I mean, he didn’t just lie. He lied about me trying to get pregnant! I mean, how messed up is that?”
My voice was rising.
Sam just rose, physically, and came to me.
With both hands on my neck, he bent his face to mine and whispered, “Calm down. He’s a dick. You know this. Baby, he put a hit on you. This is the least of his sins. Let it go.”
I glared into Sam’s eyes.
He was right.
I sucked in breath.
Then I let it go.
But I was still pissed so I turned to Dad, Sam’s hands dropped and I laid it out for my father.
“Right, you know eve
rything now. And it’s bad. And I can’t say I’m not scared. And I also can’t say that I have my head straight about all that’s gone on. What I can say is, I don’t need the additional guilt of thinking you and Mom are beating yourself up about this. I understand how you feel and I’m sorry you feel that way, Dad. But the bottom line of it is, I picked him, I married him, I stayed with him and I put up with his shit without asking for help. I brought this on you, you didn’t marry him. So please, I need you to work through it and get past it because it’s done, that part at least. We all need to move toward letting it go. Can you do that for me?”
I watched my Dad’s face get soft and in an equally soft voice he promised, “Yeah, Kia, honey, I can do that for you. I can talk to your Mom too. What I can’t say is that it’ll happen tomorrow but I can say I promise we’ll try.”
I nodded.
Dad wasn’t done.
“But what we’ll need from you is to know where you’re at.” His eyes strayed to Sam before coming back to me and he whispered, “First time in a long time, standing right in front of me, I see even a hint of my Kiakee. I’m glad to have her back but I know there’s work you gotta do. What your mother and I need is for you to let us in and help you do it.”