Where The Heart Is Part 6

place . . . moving in and out, back and forth, rocking her head forward and back . . . his mouth hot against hers, filling her with his heat . . .

and then he made a sound, some dark sound back in his throat, and his mouth went slack as his tongue slipped out, slipped free.

Moments later, he twisted away from her, pushing her away, back against the seat.

"Give it to me," he said.

"What?"

"The money." The girl stiffened at something she heard in his voice, something jagged and sharp, like words torn by the blade of a knife.

She pulled the money out of her purse and put it in his hand. He didn't look at the bills, didn't count them, just stuffed them in his pocket, then started the car and pulled away.

He was quiet until they reached the edge of town when he saw the neon sign over the bar where he had met the girl.

"Who's Tom Pony?" w.i.l.l.y Jack asked.

"My daddy."

He laughed. "Don't suppose you'd like to stop in and say goodbye."

She didn't answer him, only slumped down a little as they drove past.

Out on the highway, w.i.l.l.y Jack opened it up and took the big Plymouth up to seventy-five, then he stretched out, putting his arm up on the seat, his hand resting just above the girl's shoulder. She pulled herself nearer the door.

"What's the matter with you?" he asked. "Think I'm gonna hurt you?"

She didn't look at him, but kept her eyes on the road.

4 6.

"Tell me something. Are you a virgin?"

"h.e.l.l no," she said too quickly.

"You are!" He grinned. "Well, I'll be d.a.m.ned." Then he let his hand slide down the seat, across her shoulder and onto her chest where he ran his fingers across her breast and around her nipple.

'"I'll just be d.a.m.ned. Got me a virgin! Well, we'll have to do something about that, won't we?"

And that's when he saw the lights flashing in his rearview mirror.

He slowed, hoping the vehicle would go around him, hoping it was after someone else, but he knew better. Then they heard the siren.

"Oh, s.h.i.t," the girl said.

w.i.l.l.y Jack pulled onto the shoulder and stopped, then waited while the sheriff crawled out of his car and walked up to the Plymouth.

"Like to see your driver's license, sir."

w.i.l.l.y Jack reached into his back pocket and got his wallet.

"Thought you got that stole," the girl whispered.

w.i.l.l.y Jack scowled at her as he handed his license through the window and waited while the sheriff studied it in the beam of his flashlight.

"What did I do?" w.i.l.l.y Jack asked, but the sheriff had walked to the back of the car where he was copying the license tag number onto a ticket.

"You lied to me about your wallet, didn't you?" the girl asked.

"I took care of it today."

"How? How did you take care of it?"

"Look. Let's pull together on this. Okay? We both want the same thing, don't we? To go to Las Vegas. Together." He reached across the seat for her hand. "Right?"

The lights from the patrol car cast his face in a neon hue.

4 7.

"Isn't that right?" he asked as he tightened his hold on her hand.

w.i.l.l.y Jack turned when he heard the swish of gabardine at the window.

"You just pa.s.sing through, Mr. Pickens?"

"He's with me, Frank," the girl said.

The sheriff bent down and flashed his light across the front seat.

"h.e.l.lo, Jolene. I didn't know you were in there."

"We're going to Albuquerque to see a movie," she said. "This is my boyfriend."

"I see."

Then he directed the light into the back seat. Jolene had loaded it with boxes and suitcases. Clothes hung from a hook over the back door; the floor was a jumble of shoes.

"You're taking a lot of stuff just to be going to a movie."

"We're going to stop at the laundrymat. Do some washing."

"Wonder if you all would mind stepping outside the car."

w.i.l.l.y Jack took his time, but the girl scrambled out, too fast, too eager to cooperate. When the lights of a pa.s.sing car moved over them, she ducked her head.

"How long you been in town, Mr. Pickens?"

"Not long," w.i.l.l.y Jack answered.

"Just a few days," Jolene said. "Three or four."

"Sir, would you open the trunk for me?"

w.i.l.l.y Jack leaned through the window, grabbed the keys, then went around to the back and unlocked the trunk. It was more or less the way he had left it, except his suitcase was open and there was a plastic garbage bag beside it. The sheriff pushed things around inside the suitcase, then untied the bag and rummaged through it for several seconds.

4 8.

"You smoke, Mr. Pickens?"

"Yeah."

"What brand?"

w.i.l.l.y Jack pulled a pack of Marlboros from his shirt pocket and held them out for the sheriff to see.

"Wonder what you're doing with fourteen cartons of Winstons then."

"What?" w.i.l.l.y Jack's voice sounded squeezed. "They're not mine."

Then the sheriff looked at Jolene.

"I don't smoke," she said.

"Mr. Pickens, you're under arrest. You have the right to remain silent . . ."

w.i.l.l.y Jack had watched Hill Street Blues Hill Street Blues back in Tellico Plains, so he knew the words, knew them by heart. He even thought the sheriff there behind him sounded a little bit like Renko. back in Tellico Plains, so he knew the words, knew them by heart. He even thought the sheriff there behind him sounded a little bit like Renko.

A deputy stood near the door. Frank, the one who had arrested w.i.l.l.y Jack, sat beside a desk, facing him. The girl was in a chair beside him, but he never looked at her. Not once. The money she had given him was spread out on the desk.

"Look," w.i.l.l.y Jack said. "I run out of money. I just come here to see what I could hustle up."

"And you hustled up two hundred eighteen dollars and fourteen cartons of Winstons-Winston Light 100s. And you run into the strangest coincidence because that's exactly what someone stole from the 7-Eleven in Puerto De Luna on Wednesday morning."

"I wasn't even here Wednesday morning. I was in Oklahoma."

"Anyone who can prove that?"

"Yeah. My girlfriend, Novalee. She was with me."

4 9.

Jolene shifted in her chair; one of the wooden slats at the back made a sharp cracking sound.

"Where is she now?" the sheriff asked. "This girlfriend."

"I left her in Oklahoma. Some town starts with an S."

The sheriff pulled an atlas from a drawer in his desk, thumbed through it a few seconds, then turned it toward w.i.l.l.y Jack.

"There's Oklahoma. Find the town."

w.i.l.l.y Jack ran his finger part way across the map, then tapped it twice.

"Sequoyah, right there."

"So, you left that girlfriend in Sequoyah, Oklahoma. With a relative?"

"No. "

"A friend?"

"No. I left her in a Wal-Mart store."

"She have a job there? In the Wal-Mart?"

w.i.l.l.y Jack shook his head as he began to pick at a tear in the knee of his jeans.

"Was she going to meet someone there?"

"No." w.i.l.l.y Jack pulled at the loose threads, giving the hole in his pants all his attention. "I just left her there."

"What do you mean you left her? You let her out?"

w.i.l.l.y Jack nodded, then hooked his finger inside his torn jeans.

"You dumped her out?"

"Yeah." He pulled at the faded denim then and ripped the jeans open from the knee to the hem. "I dumped her out."

"That's what you were going to do to me, wasn't it," the girl yelled. "Dump me off like some stray dog." Her voice slid into a higher register. "You son of a b.i.t.c.h."

5 0.

"Now Jolene, don't be harsh," the sheriff said. "Let's give Mr.

Pickens the opportunity to be heard." The deputy at the door laughed.

"So what time was it on Wednesday when you dumped this girl out?"

"I don't know. 'Bout ten. Maybe eleven."

"That's a lie," Jolene said. "He was here with me on Tuesday night. Asked me to go to Las Vegas with him. That was late Tuesday night. Said he'd figure out a way to get the money if I'd just go with him."

"No," w.i.l.l.y Jack yelled. "I said-"

"That's right, Mr. Pickens. You said. said. But can you prove it?" But can you prove it?"

The sheriff stared at w.i.l.l.y Jack a moment, then raised his eyes to the other man beside the door. When he looked back at w.i.l.l.y Jack, he was shaking his head.