Page 75 of Waiting in Wyoming
“Guess you stepped into it this time.” Bruce stepped over Sonny’s body. The kid was dead.
The stare was distinctive.
Wayne hurt for that kid. For that innocent little baby right there. In Bruce Tyler’s hand. Tyler just kept swinging the carrier rhythmically. The blood-covered carrier.
“Poor kid. Met him a few times. We had a lot in common. I lost two women to that damned drug, Wayne. That drug you helped them get around. I hope everyone you hurt is burning ahole in your soul right now,” Tyler said. “Heard good old Sonny had a kid now. Heard that girlfriend of his died from OPJ, too. She was a real sweet kid, barely even twenty. I met her once. She liked Mickey Mouse, and now she’s dead. Just dead. Because of that OPJ and soulless, conscienceless men like you.”
Bruce looked at the baby in the carrier, who was still crying. “Too pretty to be his kid. Looks like her mama.”
“Baby’s name…is Katie,” Wayne said. “And he loved his daughter.”
“Katie? Hot damn.” Bruce reached out, put a pacifier in the baby’s mouth. “Well, this Katie’s probably better off now.”
He looked at Wayne. “Sorry about your shitty luck, Wayne. But, well, I am a man who believes we all get what we deserve in the end. Remember that. See you in the afterlife. I’m sure we’ll meet again.”
66
Meyra fought screaming.He’d opened the rear door of the van, snapped ababy seatinto the only rear passenger seat that was still left in the van, and blown a kiss at Meyra. “Figure she’ll be a nice start on our happy little family, wifey.”
“This…this is Katie. Why is she here? Where is her dad?” She recognized that baby carrier. Meyra had helped Dylan fold Katie’s blankets out of the coin-operated laundry herself after Katie’s dad had been nearly killed in that hit-and-run. She recognized that blanket.
“Is she hurt?” There was blood on the baby. Lots of it. “Please, untie my hands. I’m not going to do anything stupid. Not with the van moving.”
And he was driving.
But…Meyra needed to make sure Katie wasn’t hurt.
“Daddy’s gone to be with Mommy. Up with the angels, kid. That’s why Baby Katie is going to be our special little girl now. Don’t think the blood is hers. Think her dad was holding her when good old Judge Fisher killed him.” He reached one hand back. Toward Meyra. “Get up here a minute, you sexy thing.”
Just like that, he slipped the ropes off of her one-handed while he drove. “Take care of her, new mommy. New daddy is running from the cops, you know.”
“Stop it. Stupid jokes just confuse me.” She wasn’t going to be afraid of him. She just wasn’t. Meyra leaned over Katie, and ran her fingers over the baby gently. “She’s not bleeding. Why do you have her?”
“Couldn’t just leave her there, now could I?” He laughed. And laughed. “Well, well, well. This is going to be fun. Sit down. Buckle up, sweet wife.”
Meyra looked through the front windshield. At a big navy truck just sitting there, idling alongside the road. “What are you going to do?”
“Have a little talk with the judge, of course. Get a bit of a pardon, if you will. Sit down.” He wasn’t joking now.
The navy truck took off.
Meyra sat in the passenger seat and fastened her seat belt.
As he started following the truck. Far too closely. Far too fast.
67
He’d toldthose assholes totexthim when everything was…finished. Why hadn’t they done it yet? Dale watched the rearview mirror for signs of them coming up behind him.
They drove ridiculously fast, those idiots.
Nothing. He had already sent Will out of there. He had other uses for that boy.
Kurt and Ashton should do what they needed and get out of there. He sent a text to his nephew telling him to finish it, for heaven’s sake. Every moment they didn’t, was a moment something could go wrong.
He suspected they were hesitant about that girl. She had been a nice kid. They had known her their entire lives. They had killed women before, but Dale could understand—it was different when it was a childhood friend.
He felt a surprising pang of grief for Wayne. They were cousins several generations back. And had grown up as childhood friends, too. Knowing Wayne was dead…yes, it did sting a little. But he reminded himself, it had had to be done.