The Forsaken

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“You want a beer?” Lillie asked.

“Yep.”

“Aren’t you still on duty?” she said, walking into her kitchen.

Qui

“You want a Coors or a Bud?”

“Long as it’s cold,” Qui

He sat in a chair in Lillie’s living room, her daughter Rose, now almost two, watching him with suspicion from a big overstuffed sofa. The little girl turned her head to Dora the Explorer, a personal favorite since the little girl found some kind of kinship with the character. They were both brown-ski

Lillie handed him a beer and sat down next to Rose. Lillie had a beer, too, and took a swig. It was nearly 1700. Qui

“When I came home, after my mom got sick, I told myself I’d never stay,” she said. “I had friends and a life in Memphis. This was a job and temporary. But then Sheriff Beckett died and you came home. And now there’s Rose.”

“Lots of ungrateful people.”

“I should have had So

On TV, Dora had just befriended a magical talking llama. The llama was apparently also friends with a Spanish-speaking flute.

“They would’ve found another way,” Qui

Lillie put her hands over Rose’s ears. “So these goddamn shitbags,” she said, “are working with and knew that sniper.”

“Yep.”

“That sniper not only shot back at me, he was trying to punch your lights out, too.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Qui

“I hate this,” Lillie said. “But they sure got us beat.”

Lillie took her hands off Rose’s ears. Rose was so intent on the cartoon that she’d barely noticed they’d been talking. The evil Swiper, a bandito fox, lurked in some bushes, waiting for Dora, the magical llama, the flute, and Dora’s monkey.

“How’d you like to attend the county supervisors’ meeting with me?”

“That’s tonight?”

Qui

“They’re going to try and do that anyway.”

“They’re going to try and embarrass me tonight,” Qui

“They may wait for the charges to come.”

“No,” Qui

“They can’t do that.”

“Nope,” Qui

Lillie tipped back her beer. Her home was a small cottage with beaded-board walls and clean, spare rooms. She had a lot of antiques from her mother, lots of old photos of people who’d lived in Jericho a long time before Qui

“They’re hoping you’ll turn,” Lillie said. “That’s what the talk of manslaughter is about. They want to get me for killing Leonard’s stooge, Burney, and probably try and make that convict my accessory.”

“That’s something,” Qui

“How so?”

“That they are so goddamn stupid, they think I’d sell you out,” Qui

“That seems like a done deal.”

Lillie leaned back into the sofa and reached for a throw to cover Rose’s small body and bare feet. The girl was bright-eyed and beautiful. As she grew, her Indian features became more pronounced. The large black eyes, the nose and high cheekbones. She’d been a miracle for Lillie, even with the tantrums and the night terrors and the screaming that came out of nowhere and grew more intense. Sometimes, Lillie said, she seemed completely detached, trapped inside her own head. They had seen specialists from Jackson to Memphis, everyone realizing whatever abuse and trauma the girl had experienced, even as an infant, wasn’t done with her.

But now, in front of the television, cuddled with Lille and watching Dora, she was happy.

“I got to go,” Qui

Lillie looked up at him, her eyes meeting his, and said, “Give ’em hell.”

Joh

Stagg waited for things to begin, taking center seat on the dais, right next to that fat old Chuck McDougal, who represented District 3, and Mr. Dupuy, who represented District 4 down in Sugar Ditch. Sam Bishop, Jr., ran things within the city limits of Jericho and was the son of a Boy Scout troop leader. Bobby Pickens ran things out toward Drivers Flat, District 5, down into the bottomland that was white, all the way to the border with the Choctaw Nation. You couldn’t rely on Bishop or Pickens. Pickens’s mind could be swayed, but Bishop thought his opinion mattered two shits.

“Call to order,” Stagg said. “Glad to see so many interested faces with us tonight. Mr. McDougal, would you please lead us all in the pledge and a short prayer?”

Dupuy was on his cell phone, talking to some woman he was courting. McDougal had been clipping his fingernails under the dais straight onto the floor. His daddy had been the biggest crook this county had ever seen and he’d have been the same if he’d had half a brain.

McDougal stood, pig-eyed and porky, and put his hand to the American pin on his chest. He gave a lot of effect to saying “under God,” as that had always been his election platform. He told people in Tibbehah that the government wanted to take the Lord out of schools.

Stagg stood, hand on chest, spotting Qui