Through a fog, Melissa said, “I just can’t hand her over to you. I can’t perform that act.”
The female deputy said, “That’s all right, I understand. Just put her in that swing, and I’ll take her out. You don’t have to hand her to me that way.”
“I can’t. I can’t.”
“Please, ma’am. We don’t want to have to restrain you to take the child. Think of the girl, think of the girl in your arms. We don’t want to risk hurting anyone.”
Melissa did it.
I heard an animal roar that turned out to be me.
Deputies cried, looked away.
The female deputy wrapped Angelina in blankets she’d brought along and backed toward the door, flanked by Morales and Sanders.
Directly in front of me, inches away, was the hem of the sheriff’s coat as he directed them. I could feel the cold emanating from it.
Angelina realized that she was being taken away and she screamed and her chubby hands shot out from beneath the blanket toward Melissa. The deputy quickly covered them back up.
Melissa shrieked and dropped to her knees.
The front door closed as the female deputy went outside with Angelina.
The sheriff said to Sanders, “Call the EMTs.”
To me, “Can I trust you to help your wife if I cut you loose?”
“Yes,” I said.
Melissa climbed back to her feet with the help of Morales, who was openly blubbering.
The sheriff watched the exchange outside through the front window, then said with grim finality, “It’s done.”
My cuffs were released, and I rolled off the couch to the floor, scrambling to all fours. Melissa was clutching herself, her eyes wild, her face bone white. I rushed to her.
She collapsed in my arms, but I held her body tight against mine so she wouldn’t slide to the floor. I duckwalked with her that way to the couch.
They say that when a person dies, the body suddenly becomes lighter as the soul leaves, that it’s been measured. Melissa didn’t die, but I remember thinking that her soul had left her because she felt featherlight in my arms.
As I picked up her legs and put them on the couch, I heard the tires of Moreland’s car crunch snow as it backed up and left.
A few moments later an EMT van, lights flashing, swung up into the driveway. The EMTs had no doubt been on call just down the street in case they’d be needed. Suddenly, there were more dark-clothed people in our house. They helped Melissa up the stairs into bed. I stood on the landing shell-shocked, my eyes burning. My jaw hurt.
There was a heated discussion as Morales and Sanders told the sheriff they refused to arrest me for assault, and if he insisted on it, he could do it himself, and they’d walk off the job. I heard him say, “Jesus, okay, okay. You guys are too damned close to this situation, that’s for sure.” While he talked, he sucked on a bloody front tooth that had been dislodged during the scuffle.
Sanders said, “You bet your ass we are.”
I went upstairs.
Melissa was sedated. Her eyelids fluttered and her grip on my hand relaxed to nothing and her hand dropped away. I looked up at the EMTs and insisted I didn’t need anything, didn’t want anything.
When I went back downstairs, the sheriff had left. Morales and Sanders stood there with their heads down, staring at their boots.
Sanders said, “I hate my job.”
Morales said to me, “Can we leave you? You won’t do anything, will you? You won’t hurt yourself or anyone else, will you?”
I shook my head no. Which meant yes.
And it was over.
THAT EVENING, as the sun set and suspended snow and ice crystals lit up with the cold fire of it and the temperature dropped to minus ten, I checked on Melissa in our dark bedroom. Still sleeping. The EMTs said she would likely be out all night. Nevertheless, I left her a note on the night table in a scrawl I didn’t recognize. I wrote:
I’M GOING TO GO GET ANGELINA.
IF I DON’T COME BACK I WANT YOU TO
KNOW I LOVE YOU WITH ALL OF MY
HEART.
LOVE, JACK
I slipped the Colt.45 into the front right pocket of my parka. It was heavy. To balance out the load, I emptied the box of cartridges in the left.
THE COLD SLAPPED ME right in the face. When I breathed in, I could feel ice crystals form in my nose. The snow squeaked beneath my boots. That sound made me grit my teeth, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood up.
I’d forgotten gloves, and the metal of the door handle of my Jeep stung my fingers.
“Where do you think you’re going, Jack?”
I froze. Cody.
I turned stiffly. He was walking across my lawn. His car was parked in front of the house, and I hadn’t even noticed it.
“I’m going to kill Judge Moreland.”
“So it’s over? They took her?”
“Where were you? I’ve been trying to reach you for days.”
“I broke my stupid phone on a guy’s head.”
“I need to go.”
“He probably does need killing,” Cody said. “But not now. Not by you.”
“Stay out of my way, Cody.”
He reached out and grabbed my coat sleeve. I wanted nothing to do with him, had no desire to hear his words. He wasn’t there when we needed him, and I had to do this myself.
Cody said, “What I’m saying is that you don’t need to go over there right now. You won’t get close anyway-the sheriff’s got cars in front of Moreland’s house just in case you thought of trying something like this. All this will do is land you in jail.”
“I don’t care.”
“You should,” said Cody. “Because I’ve fucking cracked this thing. We’re going to be able to get that son of a bitch Moreland and get your daughter back.”
I blinked.
“That’s right,” he said.
“How?”
“I’ve got somebody with me you’ll want to meet.”
I looked at Cody’s car again. There was no one in it. But I noticed something I hadn’t seen before. The car was trembling a bit, rocking slightly side to side.
“He’s in the trunk,” Cody said. “Let’s go get him and have a little talk inside.”
TWENTY-FOUR
INTRODUCE YOURSELF TO MR. MCGUANE,” Cody said to the disheveled little man he shoved roughly through my front door.
He mumbled something in a tight-lipped way that sounded like “My-wott.”
“Where’s Melissa?” Cody asked me.
I chinned upstairs. “Sedated.”
Cody shook his head. “Bastards. Is she okay?”
“How could she be?”
“Bastards.”
“They came this morning. The sheriff and three deputies. The judge and Garrett stayed out in their car and didn’t even come in.”
My-wott stood there, watching us go back and forth as if he were observing a tennis match. By his blank expression I could tell he had no idea what we were talking about.
“Sit,” Cody said to My-wott, indicating the couch. The little man shuffled over to it stiff-legged and sat down. I could see now why he couldn’t talk and could barely move: He was freezing. His skin was sallow. His teeth were chattering so hard it sounded like popcorn popping. My-wott was thin, stooped, mousy. I guessed his build at five-four, 130. He had badly cut brown hair, thick horn-rimmed glasses, no chin but a prominent Adam’s apple, and his face was a moonscape of old acne scars. He had furtive, darting eyes and a manner to him that was weak and annoying. I felt sorry for him but wanted to hit him at the same time. He wore a red-checked plaid shirt, baggy jeans, and Crocs shoes. His arms shot out when he sat down, and I noted a massive gold Rolex on his wrist that just didn’t go with the rest of him. It looked like it weighed two pounds.