Page 39 of The Sound of Sleighbells

As he turned and left the porch, a pair of headlights rounded the corner, coming toward her house. Was it Grace, bringing Skip home?

But no. It was only the pizza delivery. She ran to get her purse as the young man came up the sidewalk. “Keep the change,” she said, handing him a $20 bill. “And thank you.”

The girls, who’d paid no attention to the sheriff’s visit, danced around her as she carried the pizza box to the kitchen table. “One piece each,” she said, putting the cheesy slices on two paper plates. “You can have more when your brother gets here.”

The pizza was still hot when Skip walked in, looking tired but happy. She wouldn’t tell him about the sheriff’s visit, Ruth resolved. Not until she knew the outcome of the fingerprint examination. Why give him a night of worry?

Her hungry children wolfed down the pizza. Ruth nibbled a single small piece, her appetite gone. Tonight was supposed to have been a celebration. Now it was just a meal. Even the lights on their beautiful tree seemed less bright.

After the children were asleep, she would phone Judd. If he’d allowed any contact between Digger and Skip, especially if it had led to lawbreaking, she would never forgive him.

* * *

Judd was getting ready for bed when Ruth’s call came. As soon as he heard her voice, he knew that something had pushed her to the edge.

“What is it, Ruth?” he demanded. “Did Skip make it home all right?”

“That depends on what you mean by ‘all right.’ ” Her voice quivered with strain, like a wire stretched to the breaking point. “You and your drug-dealing friend may have ruined my boy’s life!”

Judd forced himself to speak calmly. “That doesn’t make sense,” he said. “Skip was fine when he left here. Tell me everything.”

Bit by agonized bit, her story emerged—how the mechanic at the garage had found a bag of cocaine in the tailgate of her station wagon, and Skip was suspected of hiding it there.

“The sheriff is checking a sample of his fingerprints against the ones on the bag,” Ruth said. “He promised to call me in the morning.”

“This can’t be serious. How much does Skip know?”

“He wasn’t home when the sheriff came. I haven’t told him anything yet. I don’t want to worry him before we know the truth. But there’s no way a boy could get his hands on thousands of dollars’ worth of cocaine—not unless somebody gave it to him to hide.”

“Damn it, Ruth. I promised you I’d keep him away from Digger, and I have. Skip has been with me in the workshop the whole time. Digger hasn’t been near him. There has to be some other explanation.”

“Then why don’t you ask your friend? Let me know what he has to say.”

“I’ll do that right now,” Judd said, but he spoke into a silent phone. Ruth had hung up.

Judd strode outside. Nothing Ruth had told him made sense—especially Skip’s alleged involvement. But if Digger was dealing drugs, the man was going to find himself back behind bars.

He cursed out loud as he saw that the bunkhouse was dark, and the Yamaha was missing from the shed. Digger was gone. Whatever he might have to say would have to keep until the bastard showed up.

Judd walked slowly back to the house. He thought about calling Ruth. But he had nothing to tell her. All he could do was wait.

* * *

Headlamp turned off, Digger rode the motorcycle past the corner where Silas Parker’s garage stood. The building would be locked tight—maybe even with a security system. But the lot in the rear, where vehicles waited to be worked on, was surrounded by a sagging chain-link fence. Crawling under it should be easy.

Stopping next to the fence, he looked around to make sure he was alone. Then he turned on his flashlight and swept the beam over the enclosure, where perhaps a dozen vehicles were parked. His pulse clicked into overdrive as he saw it—the old brown station wagon with the glass missing from the rear window frame.

At last.

Digger had seen Ruth deliver the wagon after school, but he’d forced himself to stay away until the late hours, when the town was asleep. Now his goal was in sight. All he had to do was get under the fence, find the stash inside the tailgate, and get out again.

Leaving his bulky leather jacket on the bike and, sticking a screwdriver in the hip pocket of his jeans, he dropped to the ground, raised the lower edge of the wire barrier, and squirmed underneath. Keeping low, he crept across the lot to the station wagon. The night was chilly, but he barely felt the cold as he crouched in the shadow of the vehicle. The back was closed, but with nothing in the space where the window would be installed, getting to the stash should be easy. He wouldn’t even have to open the latch. With the screwdriver in one hand, he pushed to his feet and reached over the bottom of the window space to pry off the panel.

The panel wasn’t there. All his groping fingers could feel was the hollow inside the door and the gears that rolled the window up and down.

He was beginning to sweat.

Finding the latch, he raised the tailgate. When he shined the flashlight beam upward, he could see a space where the stash might have been hidden. But it wasn’t there. Nor was it on the floor, under the seats, or anywhere else.

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