Passing through Perfect (Wyattsville #3)(46)

Moran’s expression softened slightly. He’d never had a wife leave him, but his mama had walked off when he was five years old. He could still remember the way his daddy sat at the table and cried night after night. Before six months had gone by, he’d put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger.

Luke noticed the change and slid into the opportunity quick as an eel.

“When Sally left I was near crazy. All I could think about was having a few drinks to get me through that day.” Putting a pitiful moan in his voice he added, “I loved Sally with all my heart, but she left me ’cause of this bum leg and run off with a man half my age.”

“Whew.” Moran gave a sad shake of his head and lowered himself into the chair opposite Luke. “A woman like that ain’t worth crying over.”

Luke went on and on about how he’d given Sally all he could afford, pampered her like a princess, and didn’t deserve the treatment he’d gotten.

Moran continued to bob his head in agreement; of course, he hadn’t seen Sally’s black eye and the missing front tooth.

“Now this.” Luke sighed. “A nigger woman’s gonna do me in. It’s more than a man can stand.”

“Well, maybe if you was to get rid of that tire…”

The start of a smile curled the edge of Luke’s mouth.

“And shave the beard…”





When Deputy Moran sat at his desk and wrote out the report, he stated that after a thorough investigation he’d found the only similarity between Luke Garrett and the boy’s description was that both drove a blue pickup truck. While the truck had a slight bit of damage on one side there was no whitewall tire, he said, and the man in question was clean-shaven.

He left a copy of the report on Sheriff Haledon’s desk, then locked the office and headed for home.





A False Truth





When Benjamin left the sheriff’s office he wanted to believe Deputy Moran would do something, but one small spot in the back of his brain argued otherwise.

Twice he waited until Isaac was sound asleep, then slipped out of the house and drove back to Luke Garrett’s place. He parked his car behind the same thicket, walked up the dirt road, and peered through the window.

On the first night the house was dark and there was no movement inside. There was also no truck parked outside, so that didn’t prove anything one way or the other. On the second night the truck was parked to the side of the house, and there was lamplight coming from what Benjamin thought was the kitchen. He crept closer and pulled himself up alongside the window. Careful not to move quickly or make a noise, he leaned forward and looked in.

A man sat in a straight-backed chair with a bottle of whisky and a glass on the table in front of him. At first Benjamin believed it to be someone else, but the longer he watched the more it began to look like Luke Garrett. When the figure stood and limped from the room, Benjamin was certain. It was Garrett, but his beard was gone.

A crack of thunder sounded in the distance but still Benjamin stood there staring at the empty chair, knowing what he’d seen but not quite believing it. When the rain began he backed away and started down the dirt road. He got halfway to his own truck when he thought of something and turned back.

This time he didn’t bother with looking in the window; it was the truck he was interested in. He walked the full way around it, but all four tires were black. Benjamin bent and scraped his fingernails against the back tire hoping it was just a thin layer of paint covering the white. It wasn’t. A whitewall tire was worth maybe five dollars. A man like Garrett wouldn’t just get rid of it; it had to be somewhere close by.

Moving to the back of the house and then circling around to the far side, Benjamin searched in back of the woodpile, behind the overflowing garbage cans, under chunks of rusting metal, and even in the wooded areas surrounding the house. Nothing. The whitewall was gone.

Luke Garrett knew. He knew that Isaac had pointed a finger at him and described both man and truck. He knew and he’d covered his tracks. There was no longer a bearded man nor was there a blue truck with a whitewall tire. Now there was only a colored boy’s word against that of a white man. Benjamin turned and started back down the dirt road. He no longer cared about being silent. What more could Luke Garrett do to him?

The rain grew heavy and beads of water mingled with Benjamin’s tears. As he climbed back into his truck he felt the weight of injustice come down on him like the mudslide of a mountain. It was the kind of thing no man survived; once you were covered you no longer had a desire to live.

With rain flooding the windshield of his truck and tears flooding his eyes, Benjamin drove home. He did not go to bed that night. He sat on the porch with water cascading down his back and tears falling from his face. Never in all his life had Benjamin wanted to kill a man—not in the army, not ever—but tonight he wanted to kill Luke Garrett. Sitting there on the porch, he could close his eyes and imagine putting a rifle to the beardless face and pulling the trigger. When the image became so real he could feel the butt of the rifle slam against his shoulder, Benjamin dropped his head into his hands and sobbed. “Lord God, forgive me.”

Before the pale pink crest of morning came onto the horizon Benjamin knew what he had to do. His love for Isaac was greater than the hatred he felt.