The Ranger - Ace Atkins [4]
Quinn watched. The other men exchanged glances. All looked down at the table.
There was a good twenty seconds of silence when all Quinn could hear was breathing and rain pinging on the roof. He sat and waited.
“You didn’t know,” Mr. Jim said.
“Know what?”
Mr. Jim looked to Varner and Varner to old Judge Blanton, Quinn noting Blanton must’ve been elected their spokesperson.
Judge Blanton took a big swig of whiskey. “Sorry, Quinn. Ole Hamp stuck a .44 in his mouth and pulled the trigger. Go figure.”
2
Lena stood before the cracked motel mirror, hair wet and combed, body wrapped in a towel, thinking only a sixteen-year-old girl could be so damn stupid to find herself in Shithole, USA, knocked up and out of cash. But she’d made that decision to find Jody, and she would’ve walked to Texas to get the truth on why he’d disappeared into a plan that had been sold as the greatest opportunity of his entire life. He said he’d hook up with some true brothers in Mississippi and make enough money that he and Lena could stop thinking about having to stock shelves at the Walmart, or worry about paying bills or borrowing money from their kin. They’d ride into town in that big car, a car that made everyone sit up and take notice, riding up so damn high that you had to look down just to see people on the sidewalks. You could spit on their pinheads, is what he’d said with that gap-toothed smile, her being too stupid to have a trace of doubt in those words.
Her reflection had fogged up from the steam. She wiped it away and looked at herself, looking for maybe a little determination in those sleepy eyes that challenged her flip-flopping gut.
She reached into her tiny purse and found that sweet little .22 peashooter she’d stolen from her grandmother.
Lena watched the mirror for several minutes, practicing just what she’d say, arms outstretched and sighting down the barrel at old Jody, watching him shit his drawers.
“How ’bout some answers, baby, or I’ll start shootin’ right for that troublemaker.”
Quinn found the girl’s motel room empty, the bed a wreck, and damp towels on the floor. He went back to his own room and changed out of the stiff black suit and into blue jeans and boots, pressing a rolled blue shirt with a hot iron. He brushed his teeth and ran a comb over his head, although his hair had been shaved high and tight the day before, tucking all his civilian gear neat back into his ruck.
The rain slowed to a steady gray drizzle.
He asked the night clerk about the girl, but he hadn’t seen her.
He asked a maid. The maid saying she’d seen the girl walking the road before daylight. Quinn looked at his watch.
He didn’t want to go. But he knew he had to.
Son of a bitch.
His mother opened the door, holding a young child in her arms and a margarita in an outstretched hand. She looked at Quinn, put the drink down on a table, and hugged his neck, Quinn smelling the same oversweet perfume she’d always worn, her crying and wanting to know why he hadn’t called. On the stereo was maybe the last song he’d heard her play, “How Great Thou Art” sung by Elvis Presley. Everything in the Colson house growing up had been either Elvis or Jesus. Jesus and Elvis. You get two of them in one song, and that sure was a winner.
Quinn hugged her back, but found it a little difficult with the boy between them.
Their house was a basic ranch built with his daddy’s L.A. money when Quinn had been born. His mother had already strung Christmas lights under the drainpipes; a dime-store plaque with a Bible verse hung on the door. A faded movie poster for Viva Las Vegas hung over the television. He used to get so damn sick of her obsession, sometimes secretly glad that Elvis was dead so he wasn’t as much competition. Quinn knew his daddy had felt the same way, maybe the reason he’d shagged ass from Jericho.
His mother was tipsy on margaritas and gospel as she pulled him inside, the television room, the dining room, and the kitchen unchanged from his childhood. In the kitchen, she asked if he wanted anything;