Digging with the cross brace had doubled her progress around the rock. It was still stuck fast, but she guessed she was halfway there. The rock was oval and large, approximately the size of a football. If the hidden end was as round and even as the exposed side, she thought, she’d be able to lift it and it would cause serious damage. If she could ever get it out. And if she wasn’t caught in the act of trying to remove it.
There had been no food deliveries during the day and they hadn’t removed the waste bucket. The stench of urine hung in the dead space. The Cateses had either forgotten about her or were punishing her for what had happened with Bull the night before. Or they were simply gone. She’d guessed the latter.
Finally, midday, she had heard the sound of the Suburban entering the compound and the voices of Eldon and Brenda. They didn’t look in on her.
An hour later, Liv had heard the main house screen door open and slam shut so hard it sounded like a gunshot.
Bull said, “Where in the hell are you going, Cora Lee?”
“Way the hell away from you!”
“You ain’t takin’ the truck.”
“Fine, you son of a bitch—I’ll walk.”
“Oh, come on.”
“I’m walkin’. See me walkin’ away?”
There was a pause.
Then, in the distance, Cora Lee shouted: “I’m still walkin’!”
The door slammed shut again. Then a third time. A moment later, Brenda said, “Bull, go get her and bring her back.”
Bull said, “Maybe I ought to let her go. It serves her right to have to walk twelve miles to town. Maybe she’ll lose some weight.”
Someone laughed. It was a new voice Liv hadn’t heard before. A younger male.
“Hell, I ain’t gonna go get her. I just got new shocks on my truck and I don’t want the suspension screwed up. Maybe you could take the front-end loader and bring her back in the bucket.”
“Dallas, you’re no help,” Brenda responded. She sounded annoyed but patient. Then: “Bull, go get her and bring her back. We can’t have her tellin’ her story all over town. If it gets out why she’s mad, we’ve got big trouble.”
Liv thought, Dallas. The special son.
Dallas said, “Maybe you should just run her over and be done with it.”
“Dallas, please,” Brenda said.
“Shit, I’ll go get her,” Bull whined.
His truck fired up a few minutes later, and Liv could hear the gravel popping under the tires as he left the compound.
He returned a half hour later, presumably with Cora Lee in the passenger seat.
—
NOW, THOUGH, Liv heard two sets of footfalls.
She slid the thin cross brace into her jeans and pulled her shirt over her head and put it on. She hid her battered hands behind her back, out of sight, and looked up as the cellar doors opened.
It was night. The beam of a flashlight hit her in the face and temporarily blinded her.
“There she is,” Brenda said to someone next to her.
Liv couldn’t see who it was, just a form that blocked out the stars. He was wearing a cowboy hat.
Dallas said, “Not my type.”
“I didn’t think so,” Brenda said.
“Maybe if you cleaned her up,” he said, as if talking himself out of his first impression.
“Hey, how you doin’ down there?” Dallas asked Liv.
“How do you think?” Liv said back.
“Better than me,” Dallas said. “I got busted ribs and a dislocated shoulder. That ain’t no fun, either.”
Liv didn’t reply.
“Luckily, I’m gettin’ better by the hour,” Dallas said. “By the end of the week, I’ll be wrestling grizzly bears again. By the way, do you know who I am?”
“You’re a rodeo star,” Liv said.
“Damn, she knows,” Dallas said, sounding impressed.
“She heard it from me,” Brenda said. “She’s from down south somewhere. She doesn’t know rodeo.”
“We got cowboys from down there,” Dallas said. “I bet she knows some of ’em. Honey, do you know Piney Porter? Or Benny LeBeau? I’ve rodeoed with both of them.”
“I don’t know them,” Liv confessed. Then, for some reason, she started to cry. She didn’t know why.
“Are you hungry?” Brenda asked.
“Yes,” she sniffed.
“Then I guess I better feed you. Sorry about breakfast and lunch. We had to go visit our oldest son down in Rawlins. I told Cora Lee to make you something, but I guess she forgot. Once she gets a mad on, it’s like the rest of the world doesn’t exist. I think the next time she decides she’s gonna walk away, I’ll let her.”
Liv welcomed the bucket as it lowered. She snatched it down quickly so Brenda wouldn’t see her damaged hands.
“We got chicken-fried steak, mashed potatoes, gravy, and green beans. Sorry there isn’t that much gravy. Dallas ate like a horse, on account he’s feeling better.”
“Thank you,” Liv said. She was starving, and she sat down on her mattress and removed the Tupperware containers one by one. Liv dug into the chicken-fried steak and spooned out the mashed potatoes and gravy. Her eyes closed as she ate, and she moaned. The food was delicious.
As she spooned gravy over the rest of the steak and potatoes, dirt sifted down from the opening and sprinkled her dinner.
“Sorry,” Brenda said. “Did I knock some dirt down?”
Liv didn’t respond. She ate despite the sandy grit. She was that hungry.
“Ma,” Dallas said, “it just seems plumb weird to keep a woman who don’t know anything about rodeo in a hole on the property.”
He said it, Liv thought, like she wasn’t even down there.
“I remember when you put Timber down there for a week that time after he wrecked the truck,” Dallas said with a chuckle. “Me ’n’ Bull used to come out here at night and piss on his head. Man, that made him mad.”
“You were naughty boys,” Brenda said.
“So why is she down there?” he asked.
“She wasn’t supposed to be with him,” Brenda said. “It was a surprise when the two of them showed up together.”
Liv looked up, beam and all, and spoke directly to Dallas.
“If you let me out of here, I’ll go on my way and never say a word about this. I swear on my mother’s grave. I know how to keep a secret.”
Silence. She assumed Brenda and Dallas were looking at each other.
After a beat, Dallas said, “You aren’t the first woman to ever lie to me right to my face.”
“I’m not lying,” Liv said. But she had to look away. The beam of light was making her eyes burn.
“Sure you are, honey,” Dallas said. She wondered how he had gotten that Texas accent if he’d grown up on the compound.
“I told you she was wily,” Brenda said.
“Maybe I ought to get Bull to come out here tonight,” Dallas said. “We’ll pretend you’re Timber down there.”
“No, you won’t,” Brenda said to Dallas, admonishing him. “You’ll get your sleep and heal up the rest of the way.”
“You’re right,” Dallas said, standing up and stretching. “She kind of bores me, if you want to know the truth.”
As he started to walk away, Brenda said, “You want to stay and watch her eat?”
“Naw.”
After a few minutes, Liv looked up to see that Brenda was still there.
After a long pause, Brenda said, “Men don’t talk.”
“Pardon me?”