Page 60 of Nothing Ever Happens Here

“Little, sweet Flor. You don’t know how to use it. Let’s not do this,” he says and starts to stand. I hesitate for just a second, then I squeeze the trigger at the ceiling and I shoot. The noise is deafening and the force pushes me back, but I have shot a gun before. Me and Millie took trap shooting lessons, and I wasverygood.

“Please sit in that chair,” I say, nodding to the kitchen chair at the small table next to the stove. He holds his hands up and does so, but still has a smirk on his face that I would very much like to shoot right off of him, but of course I don’t do that. I can’t.

“Tell me where Shelby is,” I say. He smiles at me, and there is a silence that is cut only by the sound of my own ragged breath as I wait for him to respond, wondering if I need to use the Taser again…if I’m capable.

“Pour me a drink,” he says back, flatly. I stare at him, my nostrils flaring and my heart racing, and then I pour some scotch that’s already on the table into a lowball glass and slide it over to him. He sits and I take a couple of steps back, afraid he could move swiftly and swipe the gun from my hand. I collect the Taser from the floor and back up against the counter where I place it, keeping it close. He watches me. I have multiple ways to hurt or kill him, and I have questions, so he’s trapped.

“I don’t know where she is. Don’t you see the lovely room I made for her?Don’t you think we’d be together in there right now if I had any control over what the fuck Shelby does with her life?” He takes a sip of his drink, and it’s like I’m looking at another person than the one I thought I knew. His eyes are dark and his face is contorted, and if I hadn’t already seen what he’s capable of I would think it’s just little Evan Carmichael playing a character in a school play. None of it seems real, or possible, but here he is. A completely changed man.

“Then why did you change your name on the hospital log? Why were you visiting Otis?”

“He used to be a business partner. He owed me.”

“Owed you?”

“Yeah. I don’t mind telling you, Florence, because I can’t emphasize enough how thoroughly every last detail was attended to. You can go to the police right now and tell them I killed Otis or Leo, and they will not find one shred of evidence. Absolutely nothing,” he says, and I remember that he was a cop for a long time, and if he planned all this to the letter, what if he’s right?

“So why do you have Leo’s ID? Why would you kill him?”

“I didn’t,” he says, and I swallow hard and force myself to cock the gun again.

Evan rolls his eyes. “He had a heart attack. I mean, I did—well, I don’t know the right word—kidnap sounds weird for an adult. Icapturedhim. And I demanded the money I was owed. We were partners all those years ago and he cut me out of the deal, and now look. Look at all the money him and Otis made—look at the lives they got to have!”

“So that night last October, you were waiting for him at his house and kidnapped him the way the police said?” I’m astonished—to think, Detective Chipped Beef got something right after all.

“I didn’t mean for the bastard to die. It was a happy accident. I didn’t know about his heart condition. I just went to the cafe and got all of his financials—and got what was mine.I think it’s only fair, really. I got a shitty life, living in a studio apartment in the city with a fiancée who was kind of a bitch anyway, because you don’t attract good girls when you fail to make lots of money and get shot in the line of duty. They leave, and then you watch these motherfuckers just living the high life with all the money that should have been mine. So no, I didn’t feel bad,” he says, and I don’t know what to do or say.

“You went to the cafe to steal his financial files, and you saw Shelby.”

Evan smiles, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Hadn’t seen her in years. It all came rushing back—the way she rejected me back in school, how much I loved her back then, and she married fuckingClay? Clay, with the fucking receding hairline and dad jokes and the stupid polo shirts? What a joke. I almost finally had my way with her then, but I had a plan, and time was ticking. I had the files and needed the money first, so I had to choose.”

“And if you can’t have her, no one can. Is that why you tried to kill her?”

“You know, Florence, I always knew you were smarter than the rest of them, but you get in your own way. It’s been nice having someone to talk to about all this, finally, but I’m done. I know you won’t shoot me and you’ll only look like a fool when you tell the police all of this. You’ll look just as desperate and delusional as everyone is starting to realize Shelby is,” Evan chuckles.

“You don’t think the police will see that room you have when I tell them about this and arrest you on the spot?” I ask incredulously.

Evan shakes his head slowly, mockingly. “Oh, sweet, naive Florence. You don’t think I have a plan for everything? It’ll be like it was never there before they could ever even get here. And they can’t search my place on your word, can they? Plenty of time.” I can’t believe what he’s saying—how calculated he’s been.All this time, and the truth had been hiding right in plain sight.

I have to find my phone to call the police and have them come while I have him cornered and they can see the room, Leo’s ID, everything for themselves, but I don’t know where he’s hidden it, and I can’t leave or turn my back for a second. I look around, scanning the room for my phone, and then I see it in his pocket, sticking out just a hair.

Okay, good. I mean, not good, but I can get one more bit of information I need from him, and then I’ll demand the phone. I can Tase his fucking neck until he hands it over. I can get out of this. But I need to know. “Tell me why Otis and Bernie, then. Why?” I raise my voice, and my body is trembling with anger and hatred.

He stands. He takes a step toward me and I hold the gun with both hands and reach it out farther, aiming at him. “I think we’re done here. Time for you to go.”

“Tell me! Why them—” is all I manage in a cracked voice. I clear my throat and try again. “What happened to him?”

But he doesn’t back down and he doesn’t answer, and he’s two steps from grabbing this gun from me, so I close my eyes and I pull the trigger, aiming the gun down. I hear a scream.

“Fuck! Are you fucking crazy!” He’s on the ground now, writhing in pain. The bullet went through his thigh. I cock the gun again, aiming it down at his head.

“Answer me! Why them?”

“Fuck! Otis was dying. Who cares? I told him what happened to Leo would happen to his wife if he didn’t give me the money I was owed from what they did to me all those years back—it’s their fault my life is a disaster. Fuck!” He holds his leg and moans, continuing when I don’t move.

“When I started coming back to town to visit my dad after he got sick I started seeing Otis and Leo around town—living the life,flashing all their money around. Look at this fucking place.” He gestures around the room. “It’s a hoarder’s dump, and this is all I got. They fucked me. He wouldn’t budge. He was scared when I told him about what really happened to Leo, but once I said it, once I used it, he had to go. But come on, it was only a matter of days. I did him a favor.”

“So what did they do to you that was so bad all those years ago? Bad enough for you to kill them?”

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