Look Closely - Laura Caldwell [99]
I called Ty. He answered right away at Long Beach Inn, and in that second after he said hello I could see him clearly. The coppery hair hanging over his forehead, his strong shoulders beneath an olive T-shirt, the hint of a smile.
“Did you get my messages?” he said.
The urgency of his voice scared away his image in my mind. “No, I’m in Chicago.”
“Chicago? When did you get in? I would have come to see you.”
“I would have liked that.” I stared out the window at the bungalows lining the highway. Somewhere, inside one of those homes, someone was having an average day, a boring day. “I got in last night. For some business. But I’ve got to talk to you.” I pulled my eyes away from the houses and stared at the back of the driver’s bald head. “I’ve got to talk to someone.”
“Yeah, sure,” Ty said. “I need to talk to you, too. That’s why I’ve been calling you all day. Something’s happened over here.”
“What do you mean?”
“My father resigned yesterday.”
“Oh.” I wasn’t sure what else to say. I thought his news would be somehow worse. “Was it unexpected?”
“Well, yeah. My father could never quit that job. He loved it. That’s why I bought the inn from them. But look, that’s not the point. I don’t know how to tell you this.”
I closed my eyes. It was going to be worse. “What?”
“He started drinking last night. He used to have a problem, but he’d quit years ago. Anyway, Mom called me because he was getting out of hand and scaring her. When I got to the house, he was totally loaded. It was pretty out of control. My mom had left the house, and I tried to get him to eat something, but he was talking crap. At least I thought.”
“What was he saying?”
“I didn’t really pay attention at first. He was saying something about how he deserved it, but I had no idea what he meant. Finally, I realized he was talking about when he got promoted to chief of police. I kept saying, ‘Yeah, Dad, of course you deserved it,’ but he wouldn’t listen to me. And then this was where it got weird. He grabbed my hand and said, ‘Tell Sutter that I could have done it on my own.’”
“Sutter?” The cab was weaving in and out of traffic, the motion making me nauseous.
“Your dad,” Ty said. “He kept repeating himself, but finally he told me that your dad had gotten him the promotion to chief of police.”
“What do you mean?”
“You know your dad was corporate counsel for the town of Woodland Dunes? Well, apparently, he got my dad his promotion by having his predecessor fired.”
“That’s crap,” I said, but my voice was weak, unconvincing.
“Maybe. But that’s not the worst part. I don’t know how to say this.”
I rubbed a hand over my face. “Just say it.” I hated the flat tone of my voice.
Ty sighed. “He might have been talking shit. He was stinking drunk.”
“What did he say?”
“He said he knew the true story of what happened to your mom. He said your dad got him the promotion to keep him quiet, and he wanted the job bad enough to go along with it.”
The cab had pulled into the airport now, and the driver stopped at the curb, waiting for me to get out.
“And?” I said, my voice anything but flat now. “Oh, my God, Ty, what? What happened?”
“I’m sorry, but he shut up then. I couldn’t get him to tell me anything else. He just kept saying that he could have gotten the job on his own, he should have done it by himself.”
The cabdriver had gotten out of the car and opened my door now. “Ma’am,” he said.
“Ty, thank you for calling me, for telling me this, but I have to go.”
“What are you doing? I could drive over there.”
“I wish so badly that I could see you right now, but I’m at the airport. I’m going to New Orleans.”
“New Orleans? Why? For business?”
“For my family,” I said. “For my mom.”
I had half an hour to wait until my flight