Page 90 of Road Queens
She’s not asking. She’s deducing.“Yes. That’s right.”
She nodded. “I would have done the same.”
He let out a rueful chuckle. “She called it ‘sweet spying.’ But after the sixth unannounced visit in two months, she put her foot down.”And her boot up my ass.
“I’ll bet! And I’m glad,” she replied, smiling. “I’m so glad. I feel like ... you know, it all imploded when Debbie Frank was killed. It was hard to see past that. But it’s nice to know we helped a few people.”
He propped himself up on an elbow, leaned in, kissed her dimple. “A few? My sister, Cora Robinson, Shelly Perkins, Beth Reinhardt, Lori Carlson, Bobby ...”
“Whoa.” She leaned back and studied his face. “Okay, that’s gratifying and a little frightening.”
“I’m sorry,” he said at once. “I didn’t mean to come off like—I did some digging after I found out what you did for Dinah, who I called yesterday, by the way, and she sends her love.”
“As long as she’s not sending more jam. No, that’s a lie; I’ll eat everything she sends me, no questions asked. So you’re on Team Pay It Forward, I take it.”
“What?”
“It’s a pool, I think. A deep, still pool. And then you drop a rock—plunk! And here come the ripples.”
“I love your sound effects. It’s like I’m standing on the bank of the pond.”
“Shush. So Cassandra watches her dad beat up her mom and thinks up OpStar. Ripple. But there are other rocks and intercepting ripples: my family did Meals on Wheels for Christmas for years, another ripple. My folks instilled in me a hatred of olives but also a love of giving back to the community. So when Cass floats the OpStar idea, I’m in. And Sidney—I’m not entirely sure about her ripples. Well, she likes a good fight. But she likes breaking them up even more. And she loved Cass. And she loves Iris. So she’s in. We help your sister, more ripples, becausethen you ran into us and were compelled to follow up. And possibly make an obsession board you don’t keep in your bedroom.”
“It’s not a board. You’re welcome to come over any time and see for yourself.”
She pointed a finger at him. “I might take you up on that.” He took her wrist, brought her index finger to his mouth, licked away the chocolate malt.
“Do you think you’ll ever get married?” The shift took him by surprise, but it seemed she was honestly curious, so he answered in kind.
“I don’t know.” If not to Amanda—and what were the odds?—then someone just like her. Someone sweet and brave and lovely, a formidable woman incapable of turning away from injustice. “I hope so. I want to.”
“Because I’m single. And you’re single.”
“Don’t tease.”
“Me, too, by the way. I know most marriages are violence-free. DV isn’t the default. It’s just ... well. Cassandra’s situation and all. I’ve gotta say, I’m amazed she told you the story.”
“Me too.” It wasn’t the most harrowing tale he’d heard—he’d been a Minneapolis cop for four years—but it made the top ten. “I thought she was brave. And not just for telling a near-stranger about the defining trauma of her life.” He tried to picture sixteen-year-old Cassandra Schmitt (now Rivers, as Iris was a Rivers the moment she drowned her husband), bleeding, screaming, fighting to save her father. Failing. And her mother’s cold efficiency throughout.
“Cassandra’s always been brave. And she’ll always tell you she isn’t.” She took another gulp. “You want to know the worst part?”
“There’s a worst part?”
“Of course there’s a worst part; isn’t there always a worst part? And here it is: Cass never could figure out if her dad did it on purpose or if it was an accident. He’d never hurt her before. Which just ramps up the awful, you know?”
He did know. Some people beat the shit out of their kids but left their spouse alone. And the reverse, of course. And some people beat the shit out of one kid but never touched the others. Some spouses abused their first wife or husband but not the second. And not because there had been a penalty like a police report or retaliation or a trial. No, they just ... didn’t beat up the other one.
A complicated creature was man, or some such bullshit.
He nodded. “Because she’ll never know. Not for sure. And so it eats at her. Thoughts with teeth, just going around and around in her brain.”
“Yes! That’s just right. Do you know, she kept both pieces of the hook? They’re in her jewelry box. Or they were the last time I saw her jewelry box. And Iris wouldn’t let her testify. It’s one of the reasons she pled guilty. God, Cass wasso madabout that.”
“Understandably.”
“Yes. Now me, personally? I think it was an accident. I think Cassandra’s dad was just trying to prove she was slow and he was fast, but he misjudged his cast again.”
“That’s a possibility.”
