Confessions Of An Old Lady Read online

  “Their president. His name is Eddy Walters. He would have been the one to make the call to shoot up our house, probably intending to kill me or Dad, or both of us, preferably. Yep. He’s the one.”

  From where I sat, I could only tell that the man he was pointing at looked a little older, like Leroy, but I couldn’t tell much more from that far away.

  “Sonny, let’s go. You’ve showed him to me, now let’s leave before someone notices us here and you get us both killed.”

  “Ah, they’re not going to do anything to me here. We’re out in the wide open with witnesses. But, yeah, let’s go. I just wanted to see the bastard who tried to kill me…who killed Melanie.”

  “You’ll get your revenge, Sonny. But now’s not the time or the place.” I put my hand on his shoulder and gave a little squeeze.

  Sonny turned over the ignition again and soon we were back out on the highway, heading back toward Nicholasville. The whole way home, I was thinking of ways I could get some solid evidence on these guys before their big sit-down, but I couldn’t come up with anything other than what I was already doing…playing the girlfriend role, batting my eyelashes, telling Sonny I loved him so he would trust me. Or at least, that’s the reason I kept giving myself.

  We pulled up in front of my house and I hopped off the bike, but Sonny stayed on. I could tell he was in a mood and I wanted to loosen him up a bit, so I offered to do something we hadn’t done since we met. “Do you want to stay the night with me?” I asked.

  His downtrodden face perked up a bit. “You serious?” You’ve never let me spend the night. Sure.”

  He pulled the bike into the carport that was next to the back of the house and met me at the door. He followed me in through the front and down the hallway to the kitchen.

  “Trish, this is a nice little place you’ve got here,” he said, looking all around him. “What’s in all those boxes?”

  “Oh, you know…things that belonged to my dad that I need to get distributed to other family members…his sister and my cousins…books, clothes, things like that.”

  “Trish,” he began. “Why don’t you just stay here in this house instead of selling it? I mean, it’s a real nice house.”

  I put my arms around him as he leaned against the dark brown kitchen cabinets. “You just want me to stay here so I’m closer to you, don’t you?”

  He kissed me smartly on the lips and said, “You got me. No, I don’t want you to move. I want you to stay here with me. We’ve got something great going on here and I don’t know what I would do if you moved…even if it is just to Lexington.”

  “Awwww…” I said, kissing him back. “That’s sweet. I’ll think about it.”

  That night, we slept in my bed for the first time. I laid there in the bed, Sonny lying on his stomach, arms tucked up under the pillow, lightly snoring, thinking how normal this felt while it was anything but.

  Chapter 17

  A couple more weeks went by and things started to return to normal. Or, as normal as things can be in a crime family. Spirits began to lift and people started hanging out again at The Hole, including Sonny and Leroy. We were there on Friday night when Jimmy came into the bar and approached Sonny.

  “Spider’s getting out of jail,” he said with no preamble.

  “What? How?” Sonny asked with a look of shock playing plainly on his face.

  “Sounds like the lawyer we hired for him was worth the money we paid him. He got him off on a technicality. Something about the cop not having probable cause to search his car. He’s coming home tomorrow.

  “That’s great!” I said, even though something wasn’t sitting right with me. I just didn’t know what. “I’m sure he’s ready to get out of there.”

  “Yeah, it was his first time in jail, poor kid. When I went to visit him he was scared out of his wits…didn’t think he could do ten days, let alone ten years. He was scared to death of being ass-raped on a regular basis by some big dude named Butch. Can’t say I blame the poor kid.”

  “You going to pick him up?” Sonny asked Jimmy.

  “Yeah. Tomorrow at seven o’clock. I’ll bring him down here, let everyone buy him a round…get him good and drunk.”

  I sat there listening to Sonny and Jimmy talk about the times they had spent in prison and the parties they had when they came back. They called them “spring parties,” because you got sprung from jail. I had not had a chance to look into Spider’s arrest like I meant to, but something about this sudden release didn’t feel right. I’d seen one too many witnesses turn state’s evidence against their group to avoid jail time and this is exactly what it smelled like to me. If Spider was working with the feds, who was it? Was it DEA? FBI? ATF? Surely if he was working with the DEA, Renley would have given me a heads-up.

  I made up an excuse to get home early, so I could call Renley. As usual, Renley was frustrated that I called him so late.

  “It’s the only time I can get away to call you,” I said.

  “All right. What have you got?”

  “Nothing new, but do you know anything about anyone from the crew being turned and working with the DEA?”

  “No. We don’t have anyone on the inside except you. Why do you ask?”

  “Because…this kid…this new kid in the crew got busted a couple weeks ago with a ton of cocaine and now all of a sudden he’s free on a technicality. Sounds fishy to me. Sounds like he’s turned state’s evidence.”

  “Hmm,” he said. “Sure does sound that way, but no. We haven’t made any deals with anyone since you’ve gone in. It has to be another agency.”

  “Can you find out? I mean, I need to know what I’m working with here. Another agency working to bring down the Lords should be coordinating with us, and if they’re not, they could screw up our whole investigation. We got in here first. It’s our investigation, damn it.”

  “Well, it’s either ATF or FBI, one of the two. I don’t know that there’s much evidence of them running guns…have you seen anything since you’ve been there?”

  “Not really. I mean, they have guns—plenty of them—but I’ve seen no evidence they’re running them, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Must be the FBI, then,” Renley said.

  “This is not good,” I lamented.

  “No, it’s not. I’ll check with my contact at the FBI…see what I can find out. In the meantime, you just keep doing what you’re doing, but be wary of this kid. What’s his name, by the way?”

  “They call him Spider, but I think his real name is Andrew Davis.”

  “All right, I’ll look into it. Heard anything else about this sit-down with the Monsters?”

  “No, not lately. I’ll bring it up with Sonny, see what he tells me.”

  “Okay, goodnight, Agent Rockford”

  “Goodnight, Renley. Oh, hey, tell Beauford I said hello.”

  ***

  The next night, everyone gathered at The Hole, waiting for Spider and Jimmy to show up. When they finally arrived around nine o’clock, cheers went up from the tables and the bar.

  Sonny walked up to Spider as he entered through the front door. “This is the second party we’ve thrown for you, newbie!”

  “Yeah, sorry about this one, Sonny. I swear, I didn’t know the taillight was out and—”

  “Ah, that’s enough about that,” Sonny quieted him. “It’s not your fault. You’re just one lucky son-of-a-bitch to dodge at least a dime on a technicality. I wish I’d been that lucky!”

  “Well, I don’t feel lucky,” he said. “I hated it in there. It was awful.”

  “County jail ain’t shit compared to the state pen,” Sonny said.

  “Or federal prison,” Leroy chimed in as he approached the group and slapped Spider on the back.

  The men all stood around laughing with Spider, which left me alone at the bar until Amanda sat down in the stool next to me.

  “Hey, Amanda,” I said.

  “Hi, Trish. What do you think about Spider getting out of jail lik
e that? Pretty awesome, huh?”

  “Yeah. I heard Jimmy yesterday talking about his time in state prison. Were you with him then?”

  “Unfortunately, yes. Jimmy and I have been together for ten years and still no ring.” She held up her hand and wiggled her empty ring finger. “He did three years not long after we started dating for assault…broke a guy’s arm with a baseball bat. Lucky he didn’t kill the bastard.”

  “Who was he?” I asked.

  “He was my ex-husband. Came around one day trying to get me to go back to him. Jimmy warned him not to come around anymore, but the next day, here came Buster, knocking on my front door. Jimmy grabbed a baseball bat and went to town on him, broke his arm…shattered it, actually. That’s why he got three years. Felony assault with a deadly weapon.”

  “What was it like, having to wait for him?” I asked, pretending I was concerned about Sonny going to prison and leaving me behind.

  “Oh, I see…you’re worried about it happening to you and Sonny.”

  I nodded my head.

  “Oh, darlin’…if it happens, if he gets arrested, you just gotta wait it out. The club would be here for you, supporting you…especially if you got kids with the man. The club’s really good about taking care of its own.”

  I nodded my head again and feigned interest in Amanda’s long story about every single thing that happened while Jimmy was away.

  Finally, Sonny returned and we finished off the evening with a couple more beers and then headed back to “my place.”

  ***

  As we both lay there panting in my bed, legs intertwined, I pulled back so I could see Sonny’s face. “Sonny…don’t you think it’s a little suspicious that Spider got out on such a little technicality?”

  “What do you mean by suspicious?” He looked down at me.

  “It’s just that he was carrying more than two pounds of cocaine. I can’t believe the DA would just drop the charges like that. It’s just a little strange…that’s all I’m saying.”

  Sonny seemed to ponder my suspicions for a brief moment before he said, “From what I heard, the DA realized the search would have been thrown out at trial, since the cops didn’t have probable cause to search his car. At least, that’s what our lawyer told us. The lawyer wouldn’t lie, would he?” We both laughed when Sonny realized his inadvertent joke. “Okay, okay, so lawyers always lie, but you know what I mean. He wouldn’t lie to us. We’ve had him on retainer for many years. He’s helped us all out at one point or another.”

  “You’re probably right,” I told him. “It just seemed a little unbelievable to me, but I guess stranger things have happened.”

  “But if you are right and Spider and the lawyer are lying about the technicality thing, why would they do that? Why would they lie?”

  I looked at him with an “are you seriously asking me that” look on my face. “Sonny…there’s only one reason in the world that anyone would lie about something like that.” As soon as I said it, I realized I had just jeopardized Spider’s life. I hadn’t meant to do that. I was only trying to strengthen Sonny’s confidence in me by acting like I was looking out for him and the club. But there was no putting the genie back in the bottle.

  Sonny turned his head on the pillow and looked up at the ceiling, his head resting on his bent arm. After pondering this for several moments, he said, “Spider wouldn’t do anything to hurt the club. He’s worked his ass off for the past year, just to be patched in and be a part of this club. No way is he ratting us out.”

  But the look on Sonny’s face betrayed his disbelief in his own words. I could see the wheels spinning in his mind and knew immediately I had possibly definitely put Spider’s life in danger. Whether he ratted on the club or not, Spider didn’t deserve to be hurt—or worse. Renley had told me earlier that day that he had looked into the situation and said that, although it did seem highly suspicious to him, everything seemed to be above board. None of his friends in the other departments owned up to a deal with Spider. If he had flipped on the club and turned state’s evidence, it was done without the knowledge or blessing of the DEA.

  I felt a knot start to tighten in my stomach. What was Sonny going to do about his doubts? The doubts I had planted in his head. Hopefully, he would look into the situation and find there was nothing nefarious going on. If not, had I just sentenced young Spider to death? Would Sonny go that far? Deep down, I knew the answer to that question. Yes. Yes, he would.

  Chapter 18

  Two weeks later, I was walking through Walmart, mostly killing time, when my black phone started to vibrate in the back pocket of my jeans. I assumed it was Sonny, since he was the only person who ever called that phone. So, without looking at the screen, I put the phone to my ear and said, “Hey there, darling. Do you miss me already?”

  But it was Amanda’s voice that responded. “Trish? This is Amanda. Where are you?”

  “I’m at Walmart. Why?”

  “You need to get over to Leroy’s place, like right now.”

  “Leroy’s place? Why? What’s going on?”

  Amanda hesitated for the briefest of moments. “It’s Spider. Trish, Spider is dead. He went hunting with some of the guys this morning and…I guess…it was a horrible accident, Trish. Leroy accidentally shot Spider.”

  I began to feel dizzy. The space around me began to spin and I felt like I was floating. Spider’s dead, I thought. It’s all my fault. I knew immediately this was no accident. There was no way this was a coincidence. Only days after Sonny and I had a conversation about Spider’s miraculous release, he just happens to go hunting? And not only that…he gets shot…and dies? No, this was no coincidence. This was Sonny. It may have been Leroy who “accidentally” shot Spider, but this was Sonny’s idea.

  This was exactly why I couldn’t let myself fall for this guy. It was why I was there in the first place—to catch a known gang member, suspected drug dealer and cold-blooded murderer. Not to fall for said murderer and lose my job at the DEA and quite possibly my life. For now, I was deeply committed to this assignment and I would have to see it through to the end, no matter what I thought about—or felt for—Sonny Jackson.

  I found a spot on an empty shelf to put my grocery items—a bag of Chex Mix, a gallon of milk, and some chocolate chip cookies, since it was that time of the month—and I half-walked, half-jogged out of Walmart. It took me only ten minutes to get to Leroy’s house and when I arrived, I noticed there were dozens of bikes parked in the driveway and behind the house. Before I could even get off the bike, Amanda was running up to me with her arms extended. She grabbed me and held me tight, swaying slightly.

  “Can you believe it? Poor Spider! And so soon after Melanie!”

  I politely pulled free from her embrace and looked at her with a hopefully convincing look of shock on my face. “No, I can’t believe it. Where’s Sonny?” I asked her, looking over her shoulder and craning my neck to see if I could spot him.

  “He’s inside with Leroy and the other guys. They’re having one of their guys-only closed-door meetings right now. They should be done any minute.”

  I followed Amanda to the backyard, where mostly the old ladies were standing around, speaking in hushed tones and looking very solemn. Spider didn’t have a girlfriend. He was too young, and besides, he had put all of his focus and energy into the club for the past year, working so hard to earn the privilege of earning his cuts and joining the crew.

  As I approached the group of women, Harry’s wife, Connie, turned to face me. “Oh, Trish…can you believe it? I know how much you really liked Spider. And he really liked you too, honey.”

  Great. As if I wasn’t feeling guilty enough as it was, I had to hear how much Spider really liked me?

  Just about the time I was going to turn and leave, since the guilt was eating me alive, the back screen door opened and out walked Sonny and Leroy. Their faces were grave and grim as they approached the group of women. Sonny walked up to me and pulled me in toward him. He didn’t say a word,
only placed his scruffy chin on my shoulder and squeezed me tight around the waist.

  After a few seconds, he pulled back and looked me in the eye and said quietly, “This wasn’t me, Trish. I know what you’re thinking, and it wasn’t me. I promise you.”

  “Not here,” I whispered. “We’ll talk at my place. Follow me?”

  He nodded his head and followed me to where all of the bikes were parked. We both got on our own bikes and drove down the lengthy gravel driveway until we reached the main road. We arrived at my house not ten minutes later and Sonny followed me, again without speaking, into the house.

  Sonny shut the door behind him and I put my hands on my hips and stared blankly at him, waiting for him to talk. I’d learned in DEA training that the first person who talks starts off in the defensive position and therefore, if you want the truth from your subject, you stay quiet until they break the silence. This had always worked for me with other suspects, and Sonny was no exception.

  “I swear to you, Trish. This was not me. I had nothing to do with this. As far as I know, it really was an accident.” He stood, shaking his head in what appeared to be disbelief. Was he telling the truth? I couldn’t tell yet.

  “You mean to tell me that just a few days after you and I discussed the possibility of Spider being an informant, he coincidentally winds up being shot ‘accidentally’ by your father?”

  “I know it’s hard to believe, but I swear I didn’t do this. I would never have hurt Spider—even if he turned against us. I loved that kid like a little brother.”

  Maybe he was telling the truth. Maybe he didn’t kill Spider. But Leroy had definitely done it intentionally, so how did Leroy know? “Did you tell Leroy about our conversation? About our suspicions?”

  A look of instant revelation appeared on Sonny’s face. It looked as if he had just connected the dots, even though I had no idea how this could have only just occurred to him. He nodded his head up and down slowly.