A horn blast behind him alerted Jeff that the light was green. His tires squeaked as he lurched forward through the intersection. The car was aimed for home, although he wanted to be anywhere but.
Driving with the sling was difficult. At least it wasn’t a stick shift like his first car. Working the gears in that shoebox on wheels in the Minnesota snow would test the best drivers in the world.
His explanation at the Urgent Care clinic on the edge of the Rubicon development was weak and noncommittal. Kind of the way Kourtney would describe him.
His arm, “Banged into something.” He left it at that, omitting the part about his wife attacking him with a clock and the fall down the stairs. He’d suffered through the pain during his night on the couch, but by morning he knew he needed actual medical attention. A hairline fracture they said. Not much to do but immobilize it and take care not to “Bang” it on anything again. The way the doctor smiled she must have thought there was a sly, perhaps slightly tipsy, story to go along with the injury. Jeff regarded her grin with a tight-lipped stare.
Thankfully there were no follow up questions, another reason to love the clinic. It couldn’t handle anything serious like the hospital, but that was thirty miles down the road, and having the nearby-clinic added to the cocoon-like feeling Rubicon Ranch gave the residents.
All Jeff could think about as he sat in the waiting room was the only other time he’d been there, with Riley. She needed three stitches after she banged her chin on the kitchen counter. Like father like daughter.
His awkward lies to the nursing staff were still better than the embarrassing call to the police. Almost as soon as the dispatcher answered, his backbone went soft.
He started off screaming for help, wailing about how his wife had gone crazy. The look on Kourtney’s face reflected back how pathetic he sounded. That familiar emasculating sneer of hers—her mouth a thin line and her eyes saying, “You sound like a woman.”
“What is your location, sir?” the dispatcher had asked.
“Um, I’m at home . . . but . . .”
“What is the address?”
Kourtney stayed frozen, waiting for him to say something stupid. Then what? After what had already happened that night he wasn’t willing to find out.
“It’s . . . never mind. False alarm.”
“Sir? Did someone assault you, sir?”
“No. Never mind. It’s nothing.” It was all he needed to have Sheriff Bryan see this report come across his desk. The police didn’t need any more reason to look deeper into their lives. Their secrets were buried right below the surface. A whiff of air would be all it took to unearth them.
Kourtney’s judgmental scowl turned to a smug grin as she turned and walked back upstairs.
Out driving, Jeff felt exposed. He much preferred the sanctuary of home. In the years they’d been residents of California, he never found time for friends. Now every face on the sidewalk or driver in another car glared at him suspiciously, an angry mob preparing their torches. They knew what he’d done. They knew his secrets.
Up ahead Jeff saw a Sheriff’s car. He cut a hard right down a street he’d never been on. Anything to avoid more scrutiny. The repetitive conformity of Rubicon Ranch made this street almost indistinguishable from his own. He wove the car around the gentle curves and past the manicured lawns, squares of green patched over the dry brown land like a bad toupee.
The muscles in his back spasmed again. They had been tender ever since his fall. He remembered the prescription in his pocket for Vicodin. “If you need it,” said the doctor cheerily.
Jeff said nothing. He wanted to tell the doctor she was a fool. No pills could take away the pain he felt. His daughter was dead. Where’s the prescription for that?
The pharmacist stabbed at her keyboard and said in a weary tone, “Give me about fifteen minutes mister . . .” She struggled with the doctor’s handwriting.
“Peterson.”
“Mr. Peterson.” The name sparked a light in the darkness. “Oh. Are you . . .?”
Jeff waited. The woman was caught. She knew she was prying, but it had slipped out as easily as gossip with her girlfriends. Her mouth gaped in strangled silence.
“I’m her father.”
“Oh, I . . . I’m sorry, Mr. Peterson. I’m sorry for your loss.” Her cheeks and neck blushed against her white coat. “I’ll get this right away.”
Jeff stepped away to the waiting area—a small green carpet and a spindle of informational pamphlets on ailments of all kinds, each with photos of pleasantly smiling people of all colors grinning through their Acid Reflux, Eczema, Diabetes and Irritable Bowel Syndrome.
The pharmacist confirmed what Jeff had known for years—that it took significantly less than fifteen minutes to fill a prescription if they really wanted. She was back in less than three.
“Here you go. Looks like you could use these.” She nodded her head at his sling as she packaged the bottle of pills.
“Nothing serious.”
“Still. Why suffer, right?” She winced, as if thinking that anything she could say would remind them both of Riley. Jeff handed her his debit and insurance card. She changed subjects while she rang up the transaction. “Crazy about the other death.”
“What death?”
“The other, um, body. In the desert.”
“Another child?”
“No. An adult. I don’t know much about it, just that they found someone else. No ID or anything.”
It meant a million things at once. Riley’s killer? Another victim from the same person who killed Riley? A necessary cover-up to keep the killer’s identity hidden?
And what, if anything, did Kourtney have to do with it?
Jeff felt dizzier than he had at the base of the stairs after his fall. He took the pills and turned to leave.
“Oh, sir. Mr. Peterson. Your cards.”
Jeff turned back, collected his debit and insurance cards, and left.