“Think about,” I said.
“Does Mom agree with this?” she asked.
“No way. And if you tell her or mention it to her, the whole deal’s off. Not only will the deal be off, but you’ll be locked up like this place is Alcatraz.”
She thought this over for a long moment. “But if I tell her what you’re offering, she’ll be mad at you, right? I mean, she’ll throw you out.”
“Certainly. And then you’ll never get to see your boyfriend.”
“When do we go?” Caitlin asked.
“As soon as you spill it.”
She shook her head. “I don’t trust you. I know you don’t want me to be with him. If I tell you, you’ll never take me there.”
“You don’t have a choice. Give it up.” When she didn’t say anything, I opted for putting more heat on her. “The longer we wait, the less chance you’ll see him. You heard what Detective Ryan said, didn’t you?”
“Some.”
“They found a witness, some mouth-breather from a trailer park who says she saw you in Colter’s house. Did you ever make the acquaintance of some guy named Loren Brooks? You know him?”
She nodded. “He came by sometimes.”
“Did he hurt you?”
“What is that bitch in the trailer saying about me?” Her face was blank, but her voice sounded capable of cutting glass.
“Enough to put Colter back in jail. They’re drawing up the papers today. He’s going back to jail—and soon. And given your reaction to this news, I suspect they have enough to keep him there.”
“Then what does it matter?” she asked. “There’s no deal you can make. They’re going to take him away.”
With great effort, I choked out the last words I needed to say. “He’s leaving town. And he wants you to go with him.”
Chapter Forty-nine
Caitlin continued to stare at me, her lips parted. The room, the house was silent. Outside a diesel engine rumbled. A school bus moved up the street, stopping and starting, collecting neighborhood kids for school. The simple routines of everyday life. Caitlin would have been driving herself to school that year. We would have bought her a cheap car, added her to the insurance.
Instead . . .
“Are you saying . . . ?”
“You want to go with him, right?” I asked.
She nodded slowly. She brought her hands together again and started picking at them.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“Yes. I didn’t think you’d let me go.”
“You want to go. And a father is supposed to make his daughter happy, right?”
She kept picking at her fingers.
I started to get up, but Caitlin spoke.
“Parents aren’t supposed to let their children go, are they?” she asked. “Not ever?”
I settled back down on the mattress. She wasn’t looking at me but continued to study her hands. Still, I could tell she was listening. “I’ve known since the day you were born I’d have to let you go someday. You were going to grow up and have a life. Get married maybe. Move away. Any parent who isn’t aware of that is setting themselves up for emotional hardship.”
I waited. Finally she said, “But it happens too soon sometimes, right?”
“It does. Like me and you. Are you reconsidering?”
“No.” She looked up. “Not at all.” She shrugged. “What about Mom?”
“She’s a big girl.”
“Will the two of you stay married?”
“No. But we aren’t going to stay married whether you’re here or not.” I felt relieved having said it out loud. “Does that bother you?”
She shook her head hard, almost too hard. She looked like she wanted to make sure I knew how little it bothered her. Abby knocked lightly on the bedroom door. Caitlin and I both jumped a little. I wondered how long she’d been out there and what she’d heard, but when I opened the door for her, she didn’t look angry.
“What are you two talking about?” she asked.
I looked back at Caitlin. “I was just telling Caitlin what Detective Ryan said.”
“Oh.”
“She heard most of it from up here,” I said. “And as for the rest . . . I guess she didn’t have much of a response to it.”
Abby looked like she wanted to say something to Caitlin, but she didn’t. She turned to me and said, “Liann’s here. She said she wants to talk to you.”
I was halfway through the door when Caitlin’s voice stopped me.
“Thanks, Dad,” she said.
I looked back. “For what?”
“For telling me what you told me.”
“No problem,” I said and headed downstairs to see Liann.
Abby followed me to the stairs. Halfway down, she placed her hand on my arm. “Did you hear that back there, Tom? She called you Dad. That’s something, isn’t it?”
I nodded. “Yes, it is.”
“Did you ask her about Buster?”
“I did.” I paused. Something caught in my throat. My eyes burned. “She thought she heard him one day. His voice.” I felt the tears coming. I choked back on them, held them in. “She said she used to think she heard our voices.”