Page 109 of Something Tangled Something True
“And how did you plan on provingthatlittle theory?” Mayte asks, cocking a dark brow as she not-so-subtly tries to get a confession out of Lemmon, but before she can further incriminate herself, one of the paramedics shouts over to us.
“Hey, Sheriff, we’ve gotta get this guy out of here. He’s bleeding bad!”
“Ah, shit. Alright, give me a minute,” he tells us. I nod in a daze, my eyes glued to the scene before me.
“I need your phone for evidence,” SheriffWilson tells Russ.
“Baldy over there already took it,” he whines, tipping his chin at Raul, the heavy-set officer.
“Sure did, and you’re gonna love what I’ve found already! We’ve got everything we need to press charges and make sure they stick,” Raul says, waving the phone around with a hearty chuckle. “And it turns out this one named Lemmon’s contact with heractualname, even wrote out their entire plan in a notes app. Included some information about a break-in, tampering with security cameras, and facts he’d researched about recorded evidence and what the Oklahoma law entails about non-consensual audio recordings.”
“Russ! You stupid bastard!” Lemmon shrieks, picking herself up off the ground and stomping off toward the ambulance. Ah, there’s the ex-wife I know and detest.
One of the officers reaches out and grabs her by the elbow, tugging her against his chest before she can make an even bigger scene and go after Russ.
“Oh, shut it, Lemmon! You’re the idiot who concocted this damn plan that got meshot! Now, can someone take me to the fucking emergency room!?” Russ yells back at her.
Lola folds her arm around mine. “It turns out Russ threw a hissy fit at the wedding when I didn’t show up. Seems his investors weren’t as excited to give him their money when they realized how volatile he can be, so he lost everything. His mom, Amy,” she says, pointing to the woman pinned to the cop car with her chin, “did some digging and reached out to Lemmon, who was all too happy to lend a hand in getting their payback,” she says, rolling her eyes. She’s far more relaxed than I am, clearly having had more time to process everything, but I know the crash will come later, when the adrenaline wears off.And I’ll be there to help her through every second.
I wrap an arm around her waist, tugging her against me and kissing the side of her head now that I’m more stable on my feet.
Lemmon is escorted into one of the cop cars, climbing into the backseat without much fuss.
Amy,on the other hand, is throwing an elbow into one of the officers’ sides, twisting around and narrowly evading them.
I pull away to run after her, but Lola’s steady hand stops me. “Just wait.”
Nugget whips out from under the porch, lurching forward and gaining speed, yipping as he chases her, putting those tiny paws to good use.
Amy peers over her shoulder, yelling as she runs, scrambling in the mud, looking unbelievably out of place in her red-and-black leather pants and feather-lined coat.
José’s black pickup pulls down the path ahead of her, illuminating Amy through the dark and rain. He stops abruptly, the passenger door swinging open.
Bexaida tosses herself out the door, bends over to pull off her shoe, and sends it sailing through the air, nailing Amy right in the head. There’s a chorus of “oofs” that meets thethwacksound. She goes down like a domino, and Nugget skids over to her, jumping on her back for good measure.
“That woman isdeadlywith achancleta,” Mayte praises beside us.
The officers rush over to her, pulling her up as Russ yells, “Good boy, Mr. Lickerton!” before the ambulance doors are pulled closed and he’s driven away with sirens blaring.
Amy is shoved into the back of a police car, still yelling obscenities as the officer slams the door in her face.
When most of the officers and the fire truck have cleared out, my entire family sits down to speak with the sheriff and the few officers left behind. We recount every creepy message, break-in, phone call, and everything else that’s happened here the last few months, gaining clarity on Lemmon’s part in all this with the help of Russ’s phone.
It turns out that Lemmon was suspicious of our marriage from the beginning, leaning on the belief thatLola and I had to have gotten together so soon after she left Russ because we’d been cheating on Russ and Lemmon with each other. After breaking into my home and confirming that wasn’t the case, thanks to the camerasshehad planted, she’d still been hoping to get Lola to leave town out of spite and jealousy. But then Amy hired someone to sneak onto the property and start the barn fire, and everything became too real for Lemmon. She tried to cut her losses and separate herself from the whole situation, but when Russ reached out to Lemmon, worried his mom was going off the rails, Lemmon ran over here, trying to warn us and make amends for her role in everything.
Jealousy is a potent toxin, worming its way into your every action, and while I may never fully understand how deep that poison runs within Lemmon, it certainly makes me feel better knowing my ex-wife wasn’t a complete psychopath. And when the night is over, I take my wife and our furry child home to bed, just like I plan to for the rest of forever.
I couldn’t be more content knowing that through it all, she choseme.And I got to marry my best friend.
Chapter Seventy-Five
AFTERMATH
SATURDAY, JUNE 28
I watchRyder and Nugget rest beside me, relieved to realize Ryder’s night terrors didn’t make an appearance for the first time in weeks. He looks so peaceful, his pillow-soft lips slightly parted, face turned toward me.
The bright afternoon sun streams in through the blinds, and I can’t help but reach out, stroking my thumb over his cheek. Resting on my elbow, I lean closer to him, desperate to commit every detail to memory.
