He remembered his moms, aunt and cousins driving from Detroit to someplace called West Branch, DeJuan and four ladies in an old Cadillac Deville, yakking, going on about girl shit, going up north for a day of shopping, listening to the Shirelles singing “Dedicated to the One I Love”-the memory coming back to him as he saw the West Branch sign and passed it.
Forty minutes after that, he was following her through Grayling, running on fumes when she pulled into a gas station. Big place had ten pumps, all of them taken except for the last one, place crowded with SUVs and RVs, big forty-foot-long motherfuckers.
He parked on the other side of the pump from her, filling his Malibu while she filled her Land Rover, catching glimpses of her, finally making eye contact, saying, “Yo, know where Traverse City at?”
“Follow 72,” she said, extending her arm and pointing to the left. She seemed wound up, tense, like something on her mind.
He filled his tank and went inside the mini-mart and paid. Bought two chocolate doughnuts with sprinkles and a large coffee. When he came out, the Land Rover was gone. He scanned the lot-saw it pulling out of the station, going left. He dropped the doughnuts and coffee and ran to his car and got in. He had to wait for an RV to get the fuck out of his way. Floored it, jerked the steering wheel, tires squealing, blew out of the gas station parking lot, took a left, picking up speed, cruising now along the I-75 bypass, fast-food restaurants lining the road on both sides, reminding him how hungry he was. DeJuan picturing a platter of chicken wings smothered in hickory brown-sugar barbecue sauce, wash it all down with a 7 amp;7 or a Cuba libre with a big slice of lime. Hadn’t eaten anything all day, starving now at three thirty in the afternoon.
He thought for sure he’d lost her, thinking what a waste of time his day had been when he saw a silver Land Rover parked in a vacant lot next to a Mickey D’s. He drove in the D’s lot, went around the building, parked with a good angle on her, facing out.
What she doing, sitting there? Then the door opened and the dog jumped out. He watched it sniff around, do its business, while he sat there smelling meat cooking, starving, stomach groaning, making noises.
He took out his cell phone, called Teddy. “Yo, Theo, what’s up?” It was a bad connection, a lot of static.
Teddy said, “I can barely hear you. Where the hell you at?”
“Ain’t going to believe where I’m at.”
On the way home from the mall, Kate had gotten an idea. The Corvette had OnStar. They could do a satellite check and tell her where it was. She called and talked to a patient customer rep with a nice voice; saying the Corvette was missing and asked if they could locate it.
The rep, whose name was Amy, told Kate the Vette was on Highway 72 just west of Kalkaska. Luke, it seemed, was heading back up to the lodge, which surprised her. It was the last place she would’ve expected him to go. She had an odd feeling, her stomach nervous, uneasy now. What was he planning to do? She called Dr. Fabick, the psychiatrist. The receptionist said he was on vacation in Europe. He’d be out of the office for ten days.
Kate said, “How can I reach him?”
The receptionist said she couldn’t. He was on an airplane headed for Paris. She called the Leelanau Sheriff ’s Department and asked for Bill Wink. She said it was important and the deputy who answered the phone-she couldn’t remember his name-said he’d get in touch with Bill and have him call her.
Kate drove home, packed a bag, put Leon in the car and took off. She was on I-75 passing Pine Knob when her cell phone rang. It was Wink. She told him the situation. He said he’d go out to the lodge and keep an eye on Luke till she got there. No problem. Bill and Owen had been friends. Fished together occasionally, and although Kate didn’t know him all that well, she thought there was enough of a connection to ask for Bill personally.
She stopped for gas in Grayling, then let Leon sniff around, take care of business. It was now three thirty in the afternoon. She hadn’t eaten since breakfast, but she wasn’t hungry. Her stomach was churning. Cutting through town, she passed a convoy of military vehicles with camo paint schemes. National Guard troops wearing camo fatigues and helmets, on maneuvers heading back to Camp Grayling, glancing at her as she drove by in her silver Land Rover with twenty-inch rims.
Then she was on two-lane 72 driving behind an RV, and it reminded her of the time Owen pulled up in the driveway in a thirty-eight-foot Winnebago Adventurer, with its dizzying three-tone exterior, a look of excitement on his face.
He said, “Do you believe this?”
No, Kate wanted to say, but she couldn’t talk, one of the few times in her life she’d been speechless.
“Let me give you the tour.”
He opened the door and they went inside, Owen giving what sounded like a sales pitch: “The interior’s a color called Caspian blue with washed maple cabinets-beautiful, isn’t she?”
Kate wondering at the time why he referred to this RV behemoth in the feminine gender.
Owen said, “She was handcrafted by the Winnebago artisans in Forest Lake, Iowa, and has got all the comforts of home: flat-screen TV, home theater sound system, queen-size bed, and gourmet kitchen. What do you think?”
“Why don’t you use it for the Cup season?” Kate said.
“You don’t like it?”
“I’m not an RV person.”
That was it. He understood and wasn’t offended and never mentioned it again.
Kate slowed to twenty behind an eighteen-wheeler and a pickup towing dirt bikes. Why was Luke going back up, risking everything? She wouldn’t let herself think about it before. Now she couldn’t think about anything else. According to Dr. Fabick, he’d been severely depressed since the accident. She knew that, but didn’t know how bad he was until the arrest. What did Fabick say? Luke was reliving the trauma over and over. But there had to be more to it. Why would he disobey her and take the car with all the trouble he was in? It seemed desperate. What was he planning to do? Was he going to kill himself? Now that was the only thing that made sense and Kate was frantic. She pictured Luke with her Smith amp; Wesson Airweight, putting the barrel against his head and she pressed down on the accelerator, gunned it around the semi, and then took chances, passing two and three vehicles at a time, forcing an oncoming pickup truck to slow down and let her in, horns honking at her questionable moves.
She made good time through Suttons Bay, passed the casino in Peshawbestown, the Leelanau Sands, going eighty up the western shore of Grand Traverse Bay, the water turquoise where it was shallow and turning dark blue where it got deep-nineteen miles to Northport and then ten minutes more to Cathead Bay.
Bill Wink’s white patrol car was parked next to Owen’s Corvette on the gravel drive outside the lodge. She let out a breath, relieved. She went in and heard explosions and lasers, watching them for a minute: Bill and Luke, with PlayStation controllers in their hands, faces animated, Bill looking like an overgrown kid in his brown uniform. He glanced at Kate, put the controller on the coffee table in front of him, grabbed his hat and stood up. He found the crease; fit the hat on his head.
“Luke, I’ve got to run,” he said. “We’ll finish it another time.”
Bill Wink moved toward Kate now and when he got close, she said, “I’ll walk you out.”
They were on the gravel drive when he said, “Luke seems fine to me. He was playing Halo when I got here. It’s a video game.”
“That much I know,” Kate said. “I really appreciate you coming out, keeping an eye on him for me.”
“Anything else you need,” Bill said, “give me a call, I’m serious.” He grinned and took his hat off and got in the car, closed the door and put his window down.