Chapter Fourteen
THE MEN BUY a Christmas tree, a six and a half foot Douglas fir they set up in the corner of Sam’s living room.
“I haven’t had a Christmas tree since Texas,” Montgomery says as they stand back and survey theirs.
“Don’t tell me that. I’ll just get depressed.”
Montgomery’s lips twitch with the hint of a smile. “Eggnog, hot toddies, or Irish coffee?”
“Tough call…Irish coffee, I think.”
Montgomery nods and heads into the kitchen.
The string lights and ornaments they bought at the local Home Depot are waiting on one of the armchairs. Sam picked most of them out, but he did manage to coax Montgomery into making a few of his own selections. There isn’t enough to fill out the whole tree, but they agreed they’ll add to the ornament collection over time, until it’s finally complete.
Sam opens the box of string lights and starts trying to figure out how to best drape them around the tree. The smell of coffee wafts in from the kitchen, and he hears Christmas music playing on the radio. He smiles because he knows Montgomery only turns it on for him. The cowboy doesn’t care much about holidays, but he’s indulging Sam.
“Aw, look at you, with the whipped cream and everything,” Sam says, when Montgomery returns with the Irish coffees.
“Well, you do have it in the fridge. The lights look good.”
Sam glances back at the tree. The string lights are wound through the boughs and plugged in, a color scheme of red, blue, green, pink, and orange.
“We should go back and get some for your house,” Sam says with a mischievous smirk.
Montgomery eyes him before taking a test sip of his drink. “Mind your business.”
Sam tries his Irish coffee too and hums. “Damn, that really hits the spot.”
“Too much whiskey or not enough?”
“It’s perfect.”
They take their time unboxing the glass balls and the glittery snowflakes, the set of birds wearing winter hats, the assortment of other animals, and the miscellaneous pieces. There’s an old red pickup truck with a tree in the bed, a saguaro cactus wearing a Santa hat, the letter S and the letter M. There are red-plaid reindeer in green scarves and shimmering gold pinecones. There are Snoopy and Woodstock, which made the men smile at the store and make them smile again now.
Sam and Montgomery give each ornament a metal hook and hang them on the tree, stopping now and then to drink more Irish coffee.
“Best and worst childhood Christmas?” Sam says.
“Mmm…” Montgomery stands with his weight on one foot and his mug in hand. “Best was ’90. I was twelve, and my old man came to see me. We rode a horse together out on the property of this rancher he knew, after dark. It was cold, but he was sitting behind me with his arms around me. Worst was ’87. My parents had a huge fight on Christmas Eve. My dad left and didn’t come back the next day, so my mom and me opened presents in the morning without him. She cried and said she was sorry they ruined my Christmas.”
He tips his head back as he polishes off his drink.
Sam can’t help but stare at him in silence. Compassion surges through him. He wasn’t expecting such a heavy answer.
Montgomery catches his eye and shakes his head. “Ancient history. Tell me your best and worst.”
Sam clears his throat. “Uh, my best Christmas as a kid, I think I was eight. My parents got me and my sister a dog. A golden retriever. We named him Patches. My worst Christmas… I was sixteen and accidentally drove my mom’s car into the garage door the night my parents were hosting a holiday party. I was kinda drunk. Dad was so pissed.”
Montgomery smirks. “They make you pay for the door?”
“Yeah, they did.”
Montgomery finally lights himself a cigarette, and Sam allows it without comment. They admire the Christmas tree in silence for a couple minutes, stealing glances at each other and never at the same time.
“Would you dance with me?” Sam blurts, emboldened by the Irish coffee.
The radio is still playing holiday tunes in the kitchen.
Montgomery smiles a little around the cigarette in his mouth. He nods and moves to close the distance between them. He takes Sam’s hand in his and wraps his other arm around Sam’s waist, while Sam rests his hand on Montgomery’s shoulder. They start to sway back and forth, taking some time to find the rhythm of their footwork. They’re a little clumsy and awkward at first, before smoothing out their steps. Eventually, Montgomery leans in and tilts his head against Sam’s until their brows are pressed together. Sam shuts his eyes and lets Montgomery move him, a deep sense of contentment sweeping through him.
“My boss is throwing a party next weekend,” Sam says when they look at each other again. “Would you go with me?”
Montgomery lifts his eyebrows a little, now using one hand to maneuver his cigarette in and out of his lips. He still has his other arm around Sam’s torso.
Sam keeps his arms around Montgomery’s neck. They’re rocking from side to side more than dancing now.
“I know parties aren’t your thing,” Sam says. “But I told him I’d go, and I’ll have a better time if you’re with me.”
“All right. What am I supposed to wear?”
“Beats me.”
They slow dance until Montgomery puts out his cigarette in his mug.
“Been meaning to let you know,” he says. “I’m bringing you a girl tomorrow morning. At the station.”
Sam gives him a confused, bewildered look.
Finally, Montgomery tells him about Shannon.
*
SHE’S STANDING OUTSIDE her house when Montgomery pulls the truck up along the curb, her black hair shining in the sunlight. She’s got her backpack slung over one shoulder. Their eyes meet across the distance between them, through the passenger window. She pauses in this last chance she has to bury what happened to her, then walks down the dirt path cutting through her front yard and gets into the truck.
Montgomery pulls back into the road and heads west toward the center of town. “I’m taking you to see my friend Sam. Sheriff’s deputy.”
“You’re friends with a cop?”
He glances at her. “Why’s that surprising?”
“You don’t seem like the type.”
“Well—we met under special circumstances.”
She doesn’t ask for details. He appreciates that.
“Is he a good guy?” she asks after a moment. “Your friend Sam.”
“Yeah. He is.”
“He’s never hurt anybody on the job?”
Montgomery looks at her again, just for a second. “Not as far as I know. And I can’t imagine he would. Doesn’t have it in him.”
“Are you a good guy?”
Montgomery doesn’t answer right away, struck by the question. He contemplates it. “Guess that depends on your criteria. And your deal breakers.”
“You ever hurt anybody?”
“Everybody’s hurt somebody.”
“You ever hurt a woman bad enough to get arrested?”
“No. And I never would.”
But I’ve killed a man. And it doesn’t haunt me.
He and Shannon ride in silence the next few minutes, past storefronts decorated with red bows and Christmas wreaths and fake pine-needle garlands, their string lights switched off. It’s still quiet in Prescott, even at quarter to nine on a Monday morning. Traffic is light, and there aren’t many pedestrians.
Around the corner from the sheriff’s station, Shannon says, “What if I tell Sam what happened to me and he doesn’t do anything about it?”
“I’ll kick his ass,” Montgomery replies.
She cracks a smile for the first time since he picked her up.
*
SAM’S ALREADY ON his feet when Montgomery and Shannon walk into the sheriff’s department’s office suite. The men’s eyes meet, and Sam gives Shannon a pleasant smile, holding out his hand to shake with her.
“You must be Shannon,” he says. “I’m Deputy Sam Roswell. You can call me Sam.”
She shakes with him, suddenly meek in a way Montgomery hasn’t seen before.
“What can I do for you?” Sam asks her, leaning against the edge of his desk.
“I want to report a crime,” she tells him. “An attempted crime.”
“Okay. Follow me over here, so we have some privacy.”
He leads Shannon and Montgomery, who remains behind her, into a small interrogation room. There’s already a yellow legal pad and pen on the table and three chairs, two on one side.
“Can I get you some water?” Sam says to the girl.
She shakes her head. “No, I’m fine.”
Montgomery sits next to Shannon, and Sam sits across from them and pulls out a small recording device.
“I’m going to record this conversation, so I don’t miss anything. But I’m also going to take notes. All right?”
Shannon nods.
“You’re not obligated to answer any of my questions. If you don’t want to, just say so.”
They start with her personal information: her name, date of birth, address, and the name of her legal guardian, her grandmother. Sam moves on to a few questions about her life and doesn’t take any notes on her answers: her school, whether she has siblings, how long she’s lived in Prescott, favorite academic subjects, if she’s going to college. He matches almost every answer with his own, telling her about himself as casually as possible, like they’re here to become friends.
Montgomery watches him, admiring Sam’s ability to pull off the right demeanor—friendly, inviting, almost warm. He admires Sam’s reasoning too: putting Shannon more at ease makes it likelier she’ll tell him the whole story.
“Montgomery said he met you on the night of December fifth,” Sam says to her. “You were running away from something. Is that what you want to report?”
Shannon nods. “Yeah.”
“All right. Why don’t you start from the beginning.”
She glances at Montgomery to her left, and he gives her the slightest smile.
“There’s this guy,” Shannon begins. “His name is Kyle Welch.”
Sam starts writing.
“He’s a mechanic over at Prescott Auto Shop,” she continues, her eyes now downcast on the tabletop. “He worked on my grandmother’s car. I’m the one who brought it in because my grandmother and I share it.”
“When was this?” says Sam.
“Early November. The car started making this weird noise in October, and we waited as long as we could to get it looked at, until we had some money saved up. I met Kyle the day I brought the car in. He seemed pretty nice at the time. I thought he was cute… I had to leave the car at the shop for a few days, which really sucked, and when it was ready, Kyle was the one who called to let us know. I went back to pick the car up, by myself, and we talked a little bit about this band we both like. I was wearing a T-shirt with their name on it. He asked me if I wanted to go out with him some time, and I said yes… I know it was stupid, but he seemed cool. I couldn’t believe he was actually interested in me.”
“Did he know you’re underage?”
Shannon shakes her head. “No. But how would he, right?”
“You didn’t tell him.”
“No.”
“Doesn’t matter,” says Montgomery. “She doesn’t look however old he is.”
Sam glances at Montgomery in acknowledgement but also to remind him this is a conversation between Sam and Shannon.
“Was Saturday, December fifth the first time you and Kyle hung out?” Sam asks her.
“No. It was the third time. The first time, we met up at the ice cream parlor on Gurley Street. The second time was Thanksgiving weekend. He invited me to this party at his friend’s house. We got drunk and had a good time. He wanted to take me home with him, but he wasn’t sober enough to drive, so I called my friend to pick me up.”
“Do you remember the name of the homeowner?”
“Not really. Sorry.”
“That’s all right. Tell me about the fifth. What was the plan?”
Shannon runs her hand back through her hair and takes a breath. “We went to dinner. That’s all I thought we were going to do. Then, he said he knew the perfect spot for stargazing and wanted to take me there. I wasn’t sure about going, but it did seem romantic, so…I agreed. Nothing had been off before that. Dinner went well. He paid for everything, and he was nice to me.”
“How much did your grandmother know about Kyle? Did she know where you met him and that he’s older than you? When you were out with him, did she know?”
Shannon gives Sam a guilty look. “She didn’t. I told her I was going out with a boy from school.”
“Okay. So Kyle drives you out of town to someplace off the Iron Springs Highway, the night of the fifth.”
“Yeah.”
“What happened once you got there?”
“Nothing, at first. He parked and put a blanket down in the back of his truck. We sat there drinking beer and looking at the stars. We started kissing… And he started feeling me up. I could tell he wanted to have sex, but I wasn’t ready. I tried to let him know without actually saying it out loud, you know? But he wasn’t taking the hint. I didn’t mind making out, but I didn’t want to go further than that. Finally, I said, I don’t want to have sex tonight, and he blew me off and kept kissing me and touching me. I said, I’m serious. I’m not doing it, and I don’t think we should kiss anymore if you’re not cool with that.”
A knot tightens in Montgomery’s gut, and he forgets Sam is in the room. He’s full of nausea and dread, not wanting to hear any more but needing to hear it. He knows exactly how Shannon felt in that moment.
She pauses, looking down into her lap.
“Then what?” Sam’s voice is softer now.
“He tried to—he tried to push me down, put me on my back, and get on top of me. I wouldn’t let him, and the way he was talking to me started to change. I told him to stop touching me, and I wasn’t going along with the kissing anymore. He wouldn’t let go of me. He tried touching me…down there. I freaked out and started screaming at him and trying to stand up and get out of the truck.”
Shannon’s eyes are trained on the edge of the table now, and she’s talking faster. Her hands are in her lap, fingers not quite curled into her thighs.
“He kept pulling me down, and I kept getting up and trying to move away. We were yelling at each other. I don’t even remember everything we said. It sounded so loud. There wasn’t any other sound except the two of us shouting.”
She stops, caught up in the memory.
Sam doesn’t say a word, just waits for her to continue.
Montgomery stares at Shannon, sitting right next to her.
“I kicked him in the face,” she says. “That’s how I got out. I didn’t even really think about it; I stood up and kicked him as hard as I could. Then, I jumped over the side of the bed and started running for the highway. I couldn’t even see it at first. But we weren’t too far. I was so afraid he was going to follow me… I ran as fast as I could, and I tried not to waste any time looking back. He could’ve caught me. I don’t know why he didn’t try.”
“Did Kyle attempt to contact you after that night?” Sam says.
“No.”
Sam looks at the girl as if waiting for her to change her answer or for her face to indicate she’s lying.
Shannon looks back at him in silence.
“You haven’t seen him or spoken to him since the night of the fifth?”
“That’s right.”
“He knows where you live, doesn’t he?”
“Yeah.”
“And where you go to school?”
“Yes.”
Sam glances at Montgomery, who makes eye contact with him.
“Is there anything else you want to tell me about the night you were attacked or about Kyle Welch?” Sam says to Shannon.
She thinks, then says, “No. I think that’s everything.”
“All right.” Sam stands up but doesn’t pick up his notepad. “Give me a few minutes. You want some water? A soda? I got coffee too.”
She shakes her head. “I’m good.”
“Montgomery, come with me, please,” Sam says.
Montgomery follows him out of the room and shuts the door behind him.
“So,” he says to Sam. “What are you going to do?”
“Well, we have a name and place of employment. We’ll see if we can find him there. If not, we’ll go around to his house. We’ll be able to pull his address on file. We arrest him, question him, then see what the county wants to charge him with.”
“You saying there’s a chance they won’t charge him with attempted rape?”
“There’s no guarantee.”
Montgomery looks away from Sam, shaking his head, hands still on his hips.
“Listen, I hate to be the one to tell you this,” says Sam. “But even if they charge him with attempted rape, assault, everything they can get away with, there’s a good chance a jury will find him innocent if the case goes to trial. Even if they convict him, the judge might give him probation if he doesn’t have a record. If he takes a plea deal instead of going to trial, he definitely won’t do any time without a record.”
Montgomery gives Sam a hard, angry look. “She’s seventeen.”
“And she went out with him first.”
Montgomery’s face falls with disgusted disbelief.
“Hey, I’m not saying it’s right or fair, and I’m sure as hell not saying I agree with it,” Sam tells him. “I’m just telling you what his lawyer will argue. She was making out with the guy willingly. The judge would take that into consideration. So would a jury. And because he didn’t complete the rape, you’re automatically looking at a light sentence if he’s found guilty at all.”
“Unbelievable.” Montgomery starts pacing in the narrow hallway. “Fucking unbelievable. He’s a goddamn pedophile!”
“Nobody’s going to look at Shannon and see a kid. She’d have to be a lot younger for judge, jury, and even the prosecutor’s office to see Welch as a pedophile.”
“You got no idea if he’s raped other girls. Who’s to say he hasn’t? Did that sound like the first time he’s tried? He planned that shit, Sam. He’s no amateur.”
“The system doesn’t convict people for crimes they might’ve committed.”
“Well, apparently, it doesn’t convict people of shit they definitely committed either!”
Sam watches Montgomery with an apologetic face.
Montgomery rubs at his brow as he calms himself. When he speaks again, he lowers his voice. “What are you going to tell her?”
“That we’ll find him and arrest him. The rest is out of our hands.”
“Yeah, you better find him before I do. Or you’ll be putting cuffs on him in the hospital.”
Sam holds Montgomery’s surly gaze. He doesn’t give the cowboy a warning, the way he would to anyone else. Sam has never spoken to Montgomery like the cop he is. He won’t start now.
“We shouldn’t keep her waiting any longer,” Sam says.
He steps back into the interrogation room first, followed closely by Montgomery.
Shannon looks over at them, where they stand together with the door at their backs.
Sam smiles at her, then moves to his side of the table again. He doesn’t sit, looking down at her.
Montgomery remains where he is.
“I think I’ve got everything I need, Ms. James,” Sam tells the girl.
“What happens now?” Shannon glances at Montgomery, then returns to Sam.
“Well, now, I track Kyle down and arrest him. If that’s what you want.”
“He’ll go to jail?”
“He’ll sit in one of the jail cells here until his hearing. If you mean—will he go to prison for what he did to you? I can’t answer that. It’s not up to me.”
Shannon stands up and sticks her hands in her jacket pockets. “You’ll call me once you’ve got him?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Thanks.”
She follows Montgomery out of the room, Sam right behind her, and they move into the main room of the office suite, where sunlight filters through the windows lining the eastern wall.
“If he shows up and bothers you, call me,” Sam says to Shannon. “Montgomery can give you my cell number. Doesn’t matter what time it is. I’ll pick up.”
“I’m dropping you off at school?” Montgomery asks her.
“I guess,” she replies, unhappy at the idea.
Sam’s and Montgomery’s eyes meet, and they trade nods.
“We’ll talk later,” Montgomery says to him.
“Yeah,” Sam says.
*
THEY GO LOOKING for Welch separately. Sam tries the auto shop where he works first, but the manager claims he hasn’t seen Welch in a few days. Sam moves on to Welch’s home address, but nobody’s there either. He figures Welch might’ve worried about Shannon reporting him and skipped town. He issues an APB for the man and his vehicle to the whole county, calls Shannon to give her the bad news, and leaves it at that.
Montgomery isn’t satisfied. He shows up at Prescott Auto Shop on Wednesday morning, hoping Welch will be there—but he isn’t. He lies to the manager, claiming he’s an old friend of Welch’s from high school, home for the holidays and hoping to hang out with him. He notices Welch’s picture framed on the wall. December’s Mechanic of the Month. That’s a face asking to get punched if Montgomery ever saw one.
He can’t stand the idea of Welch disappearing and starting over somewhere else. It’s all he can think about the rest of the week. When he’s working on the ranch, when he’s home alone in the evenings, when he’s hanging out with Sam. All he sees is Shannon running down Iron Springs Road in the dark and Welch’s pristine face and smile full of teeth.