“So, Danny just happened to be here?”
Charlie shrugged. “He’s a drug dealer. He’s at the station a lot.”
Sam searched her purse for a tissue. “Is that how he purchased that gauche truck?”
“He’s not that good at selling drugs.” Charlie watched as the truck squealed the wrong way up the one-way street. “Prices at the Gauche Truck Emporium are through the roof.”
“I read that in the Times.” Sam used the tissue to pat sweat from her face. She had no idea why she’d even spoken to Danny Culpepper, and there was not enough time left on earth to explain her words to him. In New York, Sam did everything possible to diminish her disability. Here, she seemed inclined to wield it as a weapon.
She returned the tissue to her purse. “I’m ready.”
“Kelly had a yearbook,” Charlie said, her voice low. “You know the thing where—”
“I know what a yearbook is.”
Charlie nodded back toward the stairs.
Sam needed her cane, but she walked the ten feet back unaided. This was when she saw the sheet of bowed plywood laid across the sloped grass on the other side of the stairs. The handicapped ramp, she supposed.
“This godforsaken place,” Sam muttered. She leaned against the metal railing. She asked Charlie, “What are we doing?”
Charlie glanced back at the doors as if she was afraid they would be overheard. She kept her voice to barely more than a whisper. “A yearbook was in Kelly’s room, hidden on the top shelf of her closet.”
Sam was confused. The crime had only happened yesterday morning. “Has Dad already received some of the discovery?”
Charlie’s raised eyebrow explained the provenance.
Sam heaved out something between a sigh and a groan. She knew the kinds of shortcuts her father took. “What was in the yearbook?”
“A lot of nasty stuff about Kelly being a whore, having sex with football players.”
“That’s hardly anomalous to high school. Girls can be cruel.”
“Middle school,” Charlie said. “This was five years ago, when Kelly was fourteen. But it was more than cruel. The pages were filled. Hundreds of people signed on. Most of them probably didn’t even know her.”
“A Pikeville version of Carrie without the pig’s blood.” Sam realized the obvious. “Well, someone’s blood was shed.”
“Right.”
“It’s a mitigating factor. She was bullied, probably isolated. It could keep her off death row. That’s good.” Sam equivocated, “For Dad’s case, I mean.”
Charlie had more. “Kelly said something in the hallway before she gave Huck the gun.”
“What?” Sam’s throat hurt from trying to keep her voice down. “Why are you telling me this when we are standing outside of a police station instead of when we were inside the car?”
Charlie threw out her hand toward the doors. “There’s only a fat guy behind a bulletproof window in there.”
“Answer me, Charlotte.”
“Because I was pissed off at you in the car.”
“I knew it.” Sam grabbed onto the railing. “Why?”
“Because you’re here for me even though I told you that I don’t need you, and you’re lying like you always do out of this misplaced sense of duty to Gamma, and pretending that it’s about this arraignment, and it just occurred to me when we walked up the steps that this isn’t the bullshit tug-of-war between us. This is Kelly’s life. She needs you to be on point.”
Sam stiffened her spine. “I am always on point with clients. I take my fiduciary responsibilities very seriously.”
“This is a lot more complicated than you think it is.”
“Then give me the facts. Don’t send me into that building where I’m going to get blindsided.” She indicated her eye. “More than I already am.”
“You’ve got to stop using that as a punchline.”
She was probably right. “Tell me what Kelly said in the hallway.”
“This was after the shooting when she was sitting there. They were trying to get her to hand over the gun. I saw Kelly’s lips move, and Huck heard it, but he didn’t tell the GBI, but there was a cop standing there who heard her say it, too, and like I said, I saw it happen, but I didn’t hear it, but whatever she said really upset him.”
“Do you have a sudden aversion to proper pronouns?” Sam felt inundated by data fragments. Charlie was acting like she was thirteen again, flush with the excitement of telling a story. “This information was less important than complaining about being second position in the relay thirty years ago?”
Charlie said, “There’s more about Huck.”
“Okay.”
Charlie looked away. Inexplicably, tears rimmed her eyes.
“Charlie?” Sam felt her own tears start to well. She could never abide seeing her sister in distress. “What is it?”
Charlie looked down at her hands. She cleared her throat. “I think Huck took the murder weapon from the scene.”
“What?” Sam’s voice went up in alarm. “How?”
“It’s just a feeling. The GBI asked me about—”
“Wait, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation interviewed you?”
“I’m a witness.”
“Did you have a lawyer?”
“I’m a lawyer.”
“Charlie—”
“I know, I have a fool for a client. Don’t worry. I didn’t say anything stupid.”
Sam did not argue the antithetical. “The GBI asked you if you knew where the murder weapon was?”
“In a roundabout way. The agent was good at playing her cards close to her chest. The weapon was a revolver, probably a six-shot. And then later, when I talked to Huck on the phone, he said they had asked him the same thing, only this time, it was the FBI asking, too: ‘When did you last see the gun? Who had it? What happened to it?’ Except I got the feeling that Huck had taken the gun. Just a feeling. Which I couldn’t tell Dad, because if Dad found out, he would have Huck arrested. And I know he should be arrested, but he was trying to do the right thing, and with the FBI involved we’re talking felony and …” She let out a heavy sigh. “That’s it.”
There were so many red flags that Sam couldn’t keep up with all of them. “Charlotte, you cannot ever again speak with Mason Huckabee, on the phone or otherwise.”
“I know that.” Charlie hung her heels over the stair, stretching her calves, balancing herself on her two good legs. “Before you say it, I told Huck not to try to see me or call me, and to get a good lawyer.”
Sam stared out at the parking lot. The sheriff’s cruisers. The police cars. The crime scene vans. The Town Cars. This was what Rusty was up against, and now Charlie had managed to drag herself along for the ride.
Charlie asked, “Ready?”
“Can you give me a moment to compose myself?”
Rather than verbalizing her answer, Charlie nodded.
Charlie seldom just nodded. Like Rusty, she could never resist the urge to speak, to explain the nod, to expound upon the up and down movement of her head.
Sam was about to ask her what the hell else she was hiding when Charlie said, “What’s Lenore doing here?”
Sam watched a red sedan make a quick turn into the parking lot. The sun glinted off the windshield as the car raced towards them. There was another sharp turn, then the tires skidded to a stop.
The window rolled down. Lenore waved for them to hurry. “The arraignment is scheduled to start at three.”
“Motherfuck, that gives us an hour and a half, tops.” Charlie quickly helped Sam down the stairs. “Who’s the judge?”
“Lyman. He said he moved it up to avoid the press, but half of them are already lining up for seats.” She motioned for them to get in the car. “He also appointed Carter Grail to stand in for Rusty.”
“Shit, he’ll hang Kelly himself.” Charlie pulled open the rear door. She told Lenore, “Take Sam. I’ll try to keep Grail away from Kelly and find out what the hell is goin
g on. It’s faster if I run.”
Sam said, “Faster for—”
Charlie was gone.
“Grail’s got a big mouth,” Lenore said. “If Kelly talks to him, he’ll spill to whoever listens.”