Devil’s Claw

Reed seemed greatly relieved once the bag was in his hand. “I’d better be going then,” he said, sidling toward the door.

Wanting a few more minutes for her assets to get in position, Joa

“I already told you, Sheriff Brady,” Reed objected. “The contents of this disk are top secret. I couldn’t possibly testify about them in open court.”

“Please don’t misunderstand,” Joa

Reed sighed. “Very well,” he said.

Making a huge show of it, he took the receipt Joa

She walked Jerry Reed to the door and then escorted him all the way to the public lobby. Halfway down the hall, Lucy Ridder was emerging from the women’s rest room. Reed rushed past her without a sideways glance, but Joa

“We’ll see you then, Mr. Reed,” she said, once he was safely out of the hall and beyond the locking security door. “Drive carefully.”

Closing the door behind him and making sure it was properly latched, Joa

Lucy Ridder nodded. “That’s the man who killed my mother,” she said.

Just then Frank Montoya came racing down the hall. “Where is he?” he demanded. “You didn’t let him get away, did you? I don’t know who this guy is, but he’s phony as a three-dollar bill.”

“He won’t get away,” Joa

Frank stopped and looked at her. “How’d you do that?” he asked.

Joa

“I beg your pardon?”

“Never mind,” Joa

“But it doesn’t make any sense.”

“Right,” Joa

About that time, Joa

“Mom?” Je

“Je

“In the principal’s office. We got out of school early today because it’s a teacher-in-service day. I went to Butch’s house, but the door is locked and nobody’s home. Grandma and Grandpa aren’t home either. Everybody’s too busy today, and they just forgot all about me. Nobody even loves me.”

“That’s not true, Je

“Good,” Je

Listening to her weeping child made Joa

“I don’t know what time exactly,” Joa

CHAPTER 28

Joa

“What do you think?” Butch asked.

The mess was gone. The broken glassware and food had been cleaned up and carted away. Someone had replaced the sliced cord on the back of the refrigerator. It was plugged in and humming away in an otherwise almost empty kitchen. The walls and ceiling had been scrubbed down, although shadows of mustard and stains of hot sauce remained visible. Those wouldn’t disappear until after a coat or two of paint. The cupboard doors and drawer fronts were mostly missing, and the broken shelves were still broken. The rest of the house was in much the same condition. With the better part of the furniture hauled away, the place had a strange, unoccupied echo to it as Joa

“Amazing,” Joa

“I had good help,” Butch replied. “I still can’t believe how hard people slaved away. I was afraid Jim Bob was going to work himself into a coronary. No matter what I said, he wouldn’t stop or even slow down. Jeff Daniels and your brother were the same way, and my father was no slouch, either. Maria

Joa

“Still,” Butch said gently, putting his arm around her shoulders. “It’s a hell of a loss.”

“It would have been a lot worse if I’d had to face the job of cleaning up on my own,” Joa

He pulled her close and kissed the top of her head. “Yes, I do,” he said.

For obvious reasons the pre-rehearsal-di

The four women who had been dispatched to Tucson earlier in the day didn’t pull into the carport until after the pizza had been delivered. They, too, seemed tired but happy. “We shopped till we dropped,” Eva Lou a

“We could have done more,” Eleanor put in, “but Butch said not to. Take a look at what we brought, Joa

One at a time Joa