Free Hellbender (Murder Ballads and Whiskey Book 2) by Jason Jack Miller Page B

dead?
     
     
     
    THREE
     
     
    Birdsong filled the morning air. The night had been far too short. My senses were still partially deadened by alcohol. Despite my best efforts to block it out, sunlight streamed through my closed eyelids. Already awake, Alex waited for me in a fleece and shorts, barefoot and cross-legged on the edge of the rock. She spied me peeking from beneath the covers.
          “Morning,” she said. And before I could even get a sense of where I was or what I was doing here, she added, “Bluebirds.”
           I rubbed my eyes and tried to see where she was pointing.
    “Daddy called me Little Bluebird because I did a report on them in third grade and became obsessed. Like, I would only drink blueberry Slushies and eat blueberry pancakes. There really aren’t that many blue foods, you know, so I gave it up pretty fast.” She suddenly got very earnest, and said, “We going for pancakes?”
    I sat up. My back hurt from sleeping on the rock. I thought we could share the sleeping pad, but Alex, apparently, needed many more square feet than I did. “The perfect cure for a hangover,” I said, mostly to myself.
    But it wasn’t the booze, or the rock or the emotional strain of yesterday that made my head spin half as much as the Lewises and the real threat they posed. Yesterday I thought I could hide forever. This morning, I now knew, they were going to force a fight. I had to call Katy as soon as I got off the river.
    Back down the mountain, I parked on Grant Street near the outfitter but far from the playground where the rest of the guides parked, so I could take Alex to the state park change house to freshen up. There were showers in there, sinks, mirrors— everything a girl needed to be civilized. I sat in the back of the Jeep and waited. The persistent sun, halfway between rising and noon, stole last night’s coolness little by little. It was going to be a beautiful day.
    Town was much busier today than it was yesterday. Out-of-state plates clogged the side streets, ignoring NO PARKING signs. A big RV stopped at the intersection and refused to budge, like a cow on its way to a slaughterhouse. The sound of inflators at the put-in drowned out most of the other sounds. A group of kids from a church group played Frisbee on the big lawn between a row of outfitters and the put- in. Traffic backed up behind the RV, horns blared their disapproval. I kept hoping the Frisbee would end up on the road.
    Alex came out looking much fresher, and kind of sad. She’d changed clothes, and carried my fleece jacket that she’d worn to sleep last night. I sat up in the back of the Jeep and smiled at her. She stopped and looked both ways before crossing Sugarloaf Road, even though nothing was coming. She saw me, and tried to smile back.
    “All better?” I said.
    She smelled my jacket before tossing it back to me. “What do you think?” “Don’t know. Just trying to help, though.” Her tone knocked me down a peg. She pulled her hair back into a ponytail and said, “I know. If you’re getting tired
    of me, Smurf said he’d treat me right.” She crossed her arms.
    “Alex, we’re going to take care of you. As soon as we’re done today I’ll call my cousin and let her know what’s up. I promise. Then we’ll head down and get you settled in.” I got to my feet and tried to touch her elbow. “I’m off tomorrow. Thought we could wait until then, but after last night with Darren…”
    “So, you’re just going to drop me off?”
    “Alex…” I wasn’t clever enough to talk my way out of the situation. I watched the RV surrender to the will of the majority and move along, then followed her around the Jeep. “You’ll be safer down there. Trust me.”
    “And you’re going to just go back to work? Right now you are the only person I trust.” Alex slid into the driver’s seat and commandeered the rear-view mirror for beautification purposes. I watched her reflection but couldn’t see her