Keep Her Safe(5)

I was nine when my mom finally told me the truth—that twelve-year-old Silas fell out of a tree while saving her from falling, and suffered a bad break that never set properly. My grandmother refused to let the doctors rebreak the bone, leaving her son with a mild limp.

Even though I had already figured out that the ninja story wasn’t real, I remember feeling completely disenchanted. I guess that tiny flame of childhood hope for the impossible had still been burning, buried somewhere deep.

Now, I watch the silhouette of a man with a limp approach the front porch where I sit, his face obscured by the night and countless flashing lights that fill our cul-de-sac, and all I want is for him to tell me another story.

One where my mother is still alive.

Silas is fifty-seven and anything but an old man, yet he climbs the steps like one, his movements slow and wooden, his shoulders hunched, his hand on the wrought-iron rail to support him to the landing. I’m guessing he’s stuck in the same surreal fog as I am.

He sounds out of breath by the time he reaches the landing. “I had my phone on silent. And Judy must have turned off the ringer to the house line while she was dusting today.”

“It’s okay.” I tried calling his numbers three times each before the cops dispatched a car to his place.

He hovers near the front door.

“They might not let you inside,” I warn him, my voice hollow. He’s the district attorney for Travis County, but he’s also the deceased’s brother. What is the protocol in situations like this?

“I don’t want to go inside.” He fumbles absently with a set of keys inside his cardigan pocket. All he has on underneath is a white V-neck T-shirt, the kind you wear as an undershirt. The kind you pick out of the hamper at one in the morning, when the police have woken you to tell you that your little sister shot herself in the head.

I can’t remember the last time I saw Silas looking so disheveled, but I’m not one to comment. Up until an hour ago I was wearing nothing but a blood-soaked towel hastily wrapped around my hips. My hair is still coated with shampoo suds.

Taking a deep breath, he mutters, “Give me a minute.” And he disappears inside, leaving me to stare out at the chaos. They must have every available officer on site, the dead-end street filled with cruisers. Our neighbors are standing on their porches in various states of dress, watching quietly. At least we live in a secluded area, where there are only six houses’ worth of people to witness this. The police barrier around the corner keeps the gawkers at a safe distance. Apparently there’s a crowd over there.

Silas emerges two minutes later. Or maybe twenty minutes. His face is drawn and pale. He eases into the porch swing next to me, pausing for a moment to take in the dried blood covering my hands. I knew I shouldn’t touch her, even as my fingers reached for her neck and her wrist, searching in vain for a pulse. “What the hell happened, Noah?”

All I can do is shake my head. The cops told me to stay put and not make calls or otherwise talk to anyone, but no one’s stopping Silas from being here, so I guess he doesn’t count.

“Noah . . .” he pushes.

“The kitchen window was open. Someone could have climbed in.”

“Perhaps.” I can tell Silas is saying that to appease me.

As fast as I flew down those stairs, no one would have had time to climb back out the window and reset the screen without my notice. Plus, why not use the door? But the doors were locked, and the alarm was set.

“Walk me through it.”

“You’re gonna be fine.”

Those were her last words to me. Jesus . . . Those were her last words and I left her there.

Silas rests his hand on my knee, pulling me back from my guilt-laden thoughts.

I tell him what I told the emergency dispatcher and the cops—that I was upstairs for no more than twenty minutes. That I was in the shower when I heard the gunshot and I came down to find her facedown in a pool of blood at the kitchen table, the gun gripped in her hand.

“And before that?”

Before that . . . “She was into the whiskey.”

“Just tonight?”

I hesitate, and then shake my head.

He takes a deep breath. “How long?”

“A few weeks.” I lower my voice. “She was saying all kinds of crazy shit tonight, Silas.”

“Oh?” He leans back, shifting closer to me. “Like what?”

“Like how she didn’t deserve her job, and didn’t earn it.”

He pauses to consider that. “Too many bullheaded bastards telling her a woman doesn’t belong as chief. Maybe it got to her head finally.”

“I don’t think that’s it.” I lower my voice even further, to a whisper. “She was talkin’ about Abe tonight. She made it sound like he was set up. And like she was involved.”

“She said that? Those exact words?”

“Not exactly, but—”

“She had nothing to do with that mess.” He shakes his head decisively. “Nothing.”

“She seems to think otherwise. Seemed to,” I correct myself, softly.

“Believe me when I say this, Noah: that investigation was the most thorough I’ve seen. There were no two ways about it, that man was guilty.” His eyes search mine. “Did she tell you why she thought otherwise?”