Then, before she could answer, he reached into the box of mice and grasped a fistful of the shredded paper. He downshifted because the brakes were shot and he eventually pulled over to the side of the dirt road and stopped the Dodge. The motor banged away but didn’t quit running. He could smell hot oil burning somewhere under the hood.
“What is it, Brandon?” she asked.
The strips of paper in his hands were blue and old. But when he pieced them together he could see the words Trust, Security, and Stockman’s printed on them.
He said, “Stockman’s Security Trust. That’s the bank that got hit years ago. These are bands that held the piles of cash together. Where did you find them, Marissa?”
“I told you,” she said. “They were in the nest. I didn’t even look at them.”
He tried not to raise his voice when he asked, “Where was the nest?”
“It was in the back of this truck. When I found it and realized their mom wasn’t around, I looked for something to put them in so I could save them. There was a toolbox under the seat of the truck so I poured all the tools out and put the babies in the box. Brandon, why are you asking me this?”
He sat back. The water tower for Big Piney shimmered in the distance.
“Pingston did that armed robbery and hid the cash somewhere inside the Power Wagon. Probably beneath a fender or taped to the underside. He got pulled over and arrested before he could spend it or hide it somewhere else. And all these years he thought about that money and worried that the old man would find it—which he did.”
Marissa seemed to be coming out of shock and she registered surprise.
“Either that,” Brandon said, “or my old man was in on the robbery all along and fingered his partner. That way, he could always have a big roll of cash in his pocket even though the ranch was going broke. We may never know how it all went down.
“Pingston told his cell mate Wade about the cash and promised him a cut of it when they got out. I heard Wade say something about protecting Pingston inside and that makes sense. Wade kept Pingston safe so they could both cash out. Only the money wasn’t there and Wade thought his old pal had deceived him all along. He went berserk and killed Pingston, then Pingston’s family.”
Brandon put the truck in gear and turned back onto the road. “We’ve got to let the sheriff know to look for Peggy’s Jeep so they can arrest Wade and send him back to Rawlins.”
“Why didn’t he kill us and eliminate all the witnesses?” she asked.
“He thought I was dead,” Brandon said. “I think maybe he panicked after Peggy and Tater were down and just got the hell out of there. Maybe chasing down a pregnant woman was too much even for Wade.”
“Or maybe,” she said, “he thought he was stranding me out there to freeze to death without a car, that bastard.”
As they entered the town limits of Big Piney, Brandon had to slow down for a dirty pickup that pulled out in front of them. The legs of a massive elk stuck straight up from the bed, and sunlight glinted off the tines of the antlers.
Marissa said, “I can’t believe you grew up here.”
Brandon patted the steering wheel and said, “We’re keeping the Power Wagon. I don’t care what my brothers or sister say about it.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know,” he confessed. Then: “Maybe because I got it to run again with my own two hands.”
BURNT MATCHES
by Michael Connelly
THE COURTHOUSE ELEVATOR was a sardine can filled with people and the collective breath of desperation and failure. Nobody ever came out a winner in this place. They all rode down in silence and defeat. Like me. I had just taken an all-counts-guilty verdict in a two-week trial in superior court. All that work, all that planning, and I didn’t turn a single juror on a single count. My client was going off to jail for a long, long time and there was nothing I could do about it. His case and his appeal would go to somebody else now. And it wouldn’t surprise me if they built the appeal around an ineffective-assistance-of-counsel cause. I lost the case. Truly guilty or not, they always blame the lawyer.
I tried to hold my breath in the elevator. I always do and I always fail. It moves so slowly, stopping at almost every floor. Others hoping to escape this place crowd up in the hallway as the doors slide open, the look of one more defeat on their faces when they realize there is no room and they must wait longer.
Finally, we reached the lobby and I pushed my way out through the trudging bodies. I headed to the exit onto Temple and then started looking for the Lincoln.