Honestly, I figured on her saying yes.
Didn’t figure on spending her birthday in the county jail. When I was younger, me and the sheriff had some run-ins, but not in a while. If we saw each other on the street, I’d say, “Sheriff Grant,” and the sheriff’d say, “Junior.” Which was what we said to each other when he walked into the interview room. He looked about as confused as I felt, but I played by Wavy’s rule: wait.
The sheriff sat down and lit a cigarette, held the pack out to me. I shook my head.
“Junior, we got ourselves a real situation. I don’t guess I have to tell you that, but I need to know what in Hell happened today.”
“Not much ’til this afternoon. Roger was sharpening a lawnmower blade and managed to cut the tip of his finger off. Mr. Cutcheon took him up to county hospital, and I stayed at the shop. After they left, Wavy showed up.”
“That’s the Quinn girl?”
“Yep. Her aunt dropped her off, and a couple hours later her aunt came back. That’s when I found out something had happened up at Quinn’s place.”
“Junior, it seems to me you’re leaving out a whole bunch of stuff there in the middle. The aunt told my deputy that girl was bare-ass naked on your desk.”
I wanted not to blush so bad, but it came creeping up outta my collar. “Yeah, we were fooling around. But she’s my fiancée. I bought her a ring, and her daddy gave me permission to marry her. Got the letter from the judge, notarized and everything.”
“Don’t lie to me, Junior. You don’t want to go down that road. Even if I could make heads or tails of what’s left of that letter, the fact is, the girl’s not your wife. Age of consent’s sixteen, and her aunt is real goddamn upset, talking about pressing charges. So you need to tell me exactly what you were doing.”
“It went a little further than it should have. I know that. But it didn’t go all the way. I wouldn’t do that. We’re gonna get married and all.” I felt bad enough how far it did go, because I was sincere about wanting to marry her first.
“Okay. I’m glad to hear that, but the situation with the Quinn girl is the least of your worries. I’ve also got a gun that my deputy found in your shop. Now, we don’t know for sure yet, but my suspicion is that’s the gun used to kill Liam and Valerie Quinn. So you tell me, how’d the gun end up there?”
“I don’t know.” I knew that gun was gonna end up in front of me to explain. “After Roger and Cutcheon left, the phone in the office rang. I went in to answer it, ’cause we’d left a message for Roger’s wife, thought it was her. While I was on the phone, Wavy came in. She closed the office door and the window blinds, but the garage doors stayed open. Anybody coulda walked in there.”
“That puts us at nearly three hours between when her aunt says she dropped the girl off and when she made the call to dispatch from your office. You didn’t leave the garage any time in those three hours?”
“No, Sheriff. I didn’t even leave the office.”
“Three hours is an awful lot of fooling around, even for a young man like you.”
My face got hotter and hotter, and even though it was air-conditioned in there, I started sweating. The sheriff waited, looking at me.
“Well, we talked quite a bit, too,” I said.
“So, that’s your story? You and the girl talked. And you fooled around some, but you didn’t have sex with her. And you didn’t leave the office any time in there. And that’s what the Quinn girl will say?”
I nodded, but it made my guts tight, thinking about the police questioning Wavy.
“Anything else you want to tell me?” the sheriff said.
“That swab they took?”
“For the gunshot residue?”
“That might come back positive.”
“Damn it, Junior. What’s the story?” The sheriff put out his cigarette and leaned a little closer, frowning.
“There was a possum messing in my trash this morning and I took a shot at him.”
“Don’t suppose you killed him?”
“I missed.”
“That figures,” the sheriff said. “Is that it? I’m not gonna find your prints on that gun? That Quinn girl’s exam ain’t gonna show there was more than a little fooling around?”
“No, sir, but what kind of exam?”
“I believe they’ll do a swab for semen and look at, you know, whether she’s got any injury. Like that.”
“Are they going to touch her?”
“Yes, I suppose they will.”
“I wish they wouldn’t. She can’t stand for people to touch her.”
It made me sick. That I hadn’t had the self-control to say, “No, Wavy.” Or the goddamn good sense to close up the shop and take her to my house. I’d had this great plan and I screwed it up with plain old carelessness.
“She’ll be okay,” the sheriff said. “And so will you, if you’re telling me the truth.”
7