“The only way that would happen is if I was stashing money or drugs on the property.”
“Are you?”
“Who do you think I am?”
“A convicted drug smuggler,” Drake said.
Patrick laughed. “You really don’t trust me.”
Drake stuffed the folder back down into the box and turned away from the bed. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to.”
“You’re supposed to because you’re my son.”
“That’s a lot to ask,” Drake said.
“You’ll see,” Patrick said. “I’m not going to be a bother to you. I’m going to be out of your hair just as soon as I can. Living my own life.” He walked over and took a set of clothes from beneath the changing table, taking his time.
“I don’t think the DEA is going to give up just because you say you didn’t do it.”
“I’d be disappointed if they did,” Patrick said.
DRAKE TOOK a long shower. Letting it run cold before he allowed himself to shut off the water and pull the curtain back. Standing in front of the mirror he listened to the house beyond the door. Outside the sun was setting and the light came through the bathroom window with a low pink hue. The slight movement of air felt on his bare feet where the cool air from the hallway slipped in beneath the door. He half expected his father to be gone when he came out of the bathroom, never to be seen again. Simply to have walked off into the woods, where the darkness might eat him.
Drake ran a hand up his forearm, pressing his thumb to the purple scar tissue. One hole all the way through. Clean and simple. It felt like nothing now, just a raised circle of skin. Only really identifiable to those who knew the story that went with it. He rubbed his thumb up his forearm several more times, watching the pink flesh go white, then fade away again as his thumb moved on. Nothing he could do about it now.
When he came out of the bathroom Patrick was sitting in the living room drinking one of the beers Sheri had bought a few nights before. Patrick’s attention turned to one of the catalogs that came every month in the mail. One of the home magazines Sheri liked to dog-ear and leave around the house even though they barely had enough money to buy groceries some months.
“You want to go by the Buck Blind?” Drake asked. He was standing at the entrance to the hallway in a pair of jeans and a flannel shirt, his towel over his shoulders and his hair mussed. “Sheri can get us a good price on a pitcher.”
“Yeah,” Patrick said, “we can do that.”
WHEN THEY GOT to the Buck Blind Sheri was just finishing up her last couple tables. She gave Drake a kiss and sent him and his father ahead to the bar. “I’ll be just another forty-five minutes,” she said. “Gary and Luke are in there if you want to say hello.”
Drake led his father through the doorway into the bar. Dim compared to the restaurant, the bar had been built when the grocer next door went out of business and the restaurant decided to expand. The walls all brick and mortar, and a doorway from restaurant to bar opened up halfway down the wall. Tables ran one side, while opposite, a wooden bar took up almost the full length of the place. Only open for five years, the bar already had the smell of spilled liquor, sweet and dusty in the air, while in the summers the air felt thick and closed up by the brick walls. Everything, even the random kitsch along the walls, gave the feel of a bar in someone’s home basement.
“I heard you guys caught your wolf,” Gary said. He was sitting midway down the bar with his face turned toward them as they came in. Luke sat on the stool beside him, still in his uniform.
“My dad actually got her,” Drake said, motioning back over his shoulder toward Patrick.
“You let the ex-con shoot the wolf?” Gary asked. “With a gun?”
“Come on, Gary,” Drake said. “You know it was a tranq gun. There’s nothing to that.”
“Just warning you. Because that’s not how the court will see it.”
“I know the rules,” Patrick said.
They sat in a line down the bar next to Gary. Luke raised his head to look at Patrick and then eased off the stool for a moment to shake the old sheriff’s hand. “Good to have you back,” Luke said.
Drake watched and after Luke sat back down he asked about Cheryl.
“False alarm,” Gary said. “One of her friends thought she remembered Cheryl saying she planned to go down to see a boy in Seattle.”
“And the parents?”
“She’s done this a few times now. Andy is still out looking for her but we’re thinking she’ll show up tomorrow or the next day.”
The bartender came by and they ordered a round, and then Drake ordered two more for Gary and Luke. Gary kept smiling, running his fingers over the edge of the pint glass and looking at Patrick. Finally saying, “You don’t recognize the bartender?”
“No,” Patrick said, turning to follow the man as he tended to a customer at the other end of the bar.
“It’s Jack.”
Patrick leaned farther into the bar, trying to get a good look. “Bill’s son?”
“Yeah, same kid. Only a dozen years older now.”
When Jack came over their way again Patrick caught the kid’s eye. “You’re the bartender here?”
“He owns the place,” Gary said.
“No shit.”
“I’m a partner,” Jack said. “I don’t own it.” He was leaning against the back bar now, his arms crossed. Skinny with acne scarring along the line of his jaw. Drake had known him his whole life. He was a little older than Drake. They’d been in high school together.
“Jack is one of my hunting buddies. Aren’t you, Jack?” Gary said, looking to Jack where he stood on the other side of the bar.
“If you call going up into the woods to drink a fifth of bourbon and stare at some trees hunting,” Jack said.
“Sounds about right,” Patrick said. “How’s your father doing? How’s Bill?”
“Passed away five years ago. The money he left me went into this bar, though, so it seems fitting. He was always putting his money into booze as it was.”
“Sorry to hear that.”
“Yeah, well it happened. That’s how it goes,” Jack said. A man at the other end of the bar signaled for service. Jack was off the back bar and beginning to walk away when he turned to Patrick and Gary. “Look, next round is on me, okay? It’s good to see you, Pat.” He was already halfway down the bar before any of them could say anything.
They moved over to a table after they finished the round Jack bought them, sitting for a long time bullshitting about the weather and giving Patrick a hard time about being back in the world. Luke making several prison-shower jokes that never got any of the other men to laugh, but Patrick nice enough to smile and let the comments roll past him. One of the old loggers down at the other end of the bar was playing Lynyrd Skynyrd on the jukebox and they listened to “Free Bird” for what seemed like twenty minutes.
“So you’re the sheriff?” Patrick said. He whistled a bit as he said it, letting the air escape from his lungs for a long time. “How’s that working out for you?”
Gary looked up from the beer in his hands. He’d been listening to the song playing on the jukebox. “To be honest: it’s tiring,” he said. “I chase down every little thing people have any concern over.”
“A cat goes missing I bet you’re on it,” Patrick said. He was smiling now and Drake could see he didn’t envy the man.
“Something like that. Luke and I spent half the day looking for that girl from town. She never was much for staying around here as it was.”