Wolfhunter River (Stillhouse Lake #3)(58)

But it’s depressing.

At the gate, the three of us are buzzed through by a guard on the other side; it’s air-lock protocols, with another gate beyond, and the guard inside protected by a bulletproof office. The county might be small and poor, but the cops here aren’t taking chances. Once we’re through that, there’s just a row of cells to our right. The first one contains an older woman in a neon-yellow jumpsuit who’s apparently asleep on her bunk, face to the wall.

Vee Crockett is in the second cell.

She’s sitting on the small, thin bed, but she slowly gets up when she sees us. Her gaze fixes on Hector Sparks, but then moves to me. Then to Lanny, who’s standing a foot farther back than I am from the bars. Not going to lie; the girl looks broken. I know that stare, equal parts dumb confusion and numbness. She has a shock of messy dark hair, and her eyes are the clearest green I’ve ever seen. Clear of everything. I don’t know exactly what I’m getting us into, and right now, I can’t even hazard a guess.

A guard has accompanied us this far. “All right,” he says. “Step back, all three of you, against the far wall. Stay there.”

I’m pleased to see that Lanny immediately obeys, and I’m half a step behind her. It’s Hector Sparks who seems to not understand the instructions. The guard advances on Vee’s cell, ready to unlock it, but he pauses to repeat what he said to the lawyer. Sparks joins us against the wall.

I get the feeling this might be the first time he’s ever been told what to do.

“Here’s what’s going to happen,” the guard says to us as he stands next to Vee’s cell. “I’m going to unlock her cell, shackle her, and we will go ahead of you to the interview room. You stay ten feet behind me at all times; you’re being watched on video camera. Violate the rules and you’ll be immediately escorted out.”

“We understand,” I say.

“She’ll be shackled to the table in the interview room. You will not be permitted to go to her side of the table, pass her any items, or touch her in any way. Do you understand my instructions?”

“Yes,” I say, and my daughter echoes me. Sparks takes his time, but finally agrees.

We do it by the book. I take the lead; I don’t want Lanny getting overexcited, or Sparks arrogantly assuming that his legal status means he’s exempt. So they follow behind me, and I make damn sure that there is more than ten feet of hallway between the guard’s heels and my toes the whole way. That’s easy enough to track, as there are markings on the floor every ten feet anyway. He stops at another gate, and I freeze immediately; I feel Lanny almost run into me.

“Hey, sweetie,” says a voice from the cells to our right, “ain’t you a little peach?”

Lanny edges closer to me. The woman’s soft southern drawl has an edge to it, and I have no doubt the comment’s aimed at my child.

“You look like you like a good time.”

Without looking at the prisoner, I say, “Shut up or I’ll pull your tongue out through your ass.”

“Jesus, bitch, calm the fuck down,” the woman says sulkily. I look over at her. She’s a bleached-blonde white woman, ragged and unkempt, thin as a medical skeleton. It doesn’t take much imagination to guess she’s in for a drug offense.

“Sit down,” I tell her. There must be something in my tone, or my eyes, because she holds up her hands and backs away from the bars. I’ve been in prison. I understand how this works.

The gate at the end opens. The guard ushers Vee into the air-lock chamber, and we have to wait on the other side.

Nobody else catcalls my kid.

By the time we’re through the double gates, we’re in an area with small rooms. Vee’s in the first one we come to, already shackled down with ankle chains to the floor, and her wrist shackles run through a thick metal hasp on her side of the table.

The guard runs through the rules again, sounding blank and bored, and then he leaves and locks the door. There are three chairs on our side of the table. I take the one on the far end from the door, and put Lanny in the middle. Vee just stares at me, then at Lanny; she ignores Sparks as if he doesn’t even exist. Under it I see a hint of something stirring. Anger, maybe. Hope. Something deep and visceral.

“Miss Crockett, I’m Hector Sparks, we spoke before?” Sparks says. Nothing. Like she’s gone deaf. “I should say, I spoke, and you pretended not to listen. I thought I’d bring in someone you already know to help us both through this process.”

Suddenly she turns her stare to him. “Go away,” she says.

“He can’t,” I tell her. “He’s your lawyer. If he leaves, we have to leave too.”

She doesn’t like that; I see a flash of petulance in her face, and then once again it goes blank. “Fine,” she says, and sits back. Her chains drag noisily on the table. She looks up at some point above her head. I wait, but she doesn’t say anything else.

“Is it okay if I ask you some questions, Vee? I want to understand what happened to you, and to your mom,” I say.

“You heard,” she says. Still looking two feet over my head. “I know you heard what happened.”

“Part of it. But only after you called me. I need to find out what happened before.”

Vee adjusts her gaze to meet mine for a bare second, and then she skips away to focus on Lanny. “This your daughter?” The girl’s got a quiet, oddly normal voice.