Semi-Psychic Life (Glimmer Lake #2) - Elizabeth Hunter Page 0,47
everything he touches. I don’t care if he did this or not. I don’t want anything to do with him.” Jackson looked between Sully and Val. “Nothing.”
“He’s your father,” Val said. “I know he’s not a good father, but he’s the only—”
“I don’t give a shit anymore!” Jackson had tears in his eyes. “He fucks everything up, Mom! I want nothing to do with him. Nothing.” Jackson looked at Sully as if daring the man to challenge him.
Sully crossed his arms, looked at Val, then back at Jackson. “You’re on the way to being a grown man,” he said quietly. “You get to choose who you want in your life. That’s part of being an adult.”
“Yeah.” Jackson tugged on his hair and spun around, hardly glancing at Val. “Exactly.” He stomped off to his room, slamming the door behind him.
Val stared at the closed door, wondering how much Andy had heard, wondering what Jackson would say to his softhearted brother, and wondering if she should intervene.
“Leave it,” Sully said. “They’re brothers. They’ll figure it out.”
Val put a hand over her eyes. “He’s so angry.” She could feel the headache starting to pound in her temples.
“He’s angry because someone who should be an adult isn’t acting like one. Kid has a right to be angry.”
Val turned and looked at Sully, her arms crossed in front of her. “Why did you come?”
“To see if you’d heard.” He waved his hat at the hallway. “Question answered.”
“Is Savannah alive?”
“She’s in intensive care right now,” he said. “That’s all I know.”
“He wouldn’t have hurt her. He wouldn’t have done that, Sully.”
Sully took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “You know him better than I do.”
Val motioned to the counter that overlooked the kitchen. “Sit. I’ll make some coffee.”
“Thanks. I have to drive back to Bridger tonight.”
“Something was wrong with her car?”
“You know I’m not supposed to tell you anything, right?”
She glanced up after she’d ground the coffee beans. “You know I’m not going to say a word to anyone.”
“Other than Monica and Robin?”
Val shrugged. “Obviously.”
“I don’t know the details—I don’t know enough about cars, to be honest—but someone tampered with the brakes. I got that much in all the technical talk.”
“Who’s doing the investigation? Bridger?”
He shook his head. “Not their jurisdiction. Technically it’s mine, and I called highway patrol. They’re the experts.”
“But now Josh is wanted for questioning about attempted murder? Even though no one has seen him around here or in Bridger for over a week now?”
“Anderson is spewing in front of the news cameras. I have no idea why. He’s saying Josh is around and in hiding. That this is all about revenge for him because Anderson complained about the missing money.”
“That’s bullshit, and you know it.”
“Hey.” He raked a hand through his hair. “I’m a lowly sheriff. No one listens to me. Unfortunately, even if no one has seen Josh, it doesn’t look good.”
As far as Val was concerned, there was one suspect in Savannah’s case, and it was the man married to her. “No one is looking at the husband?”
“He’s friends with the entire police department, and he’s playing the distraught husband. Of course they’re not. Savannah was heading up to Glimmer Lake. Her husband said something about a book club?”
“They don’t meet tonight,” Val said. “Maybe she was coming up to talk to me. Or see Josh. Maybe she knows where he is.”
“As far as Bridger PD is concerned, Savannah Anderson was a happy wife. They don’t know anything about her and Josh, and I haven’t shared that with them.”
Val poured boiling water into a French press. “Do you think that would make Josh more or less of a suspect?”
“Honestly, I don’t have any idea. I’m with you. I think the husband is dirty.”
A ball of anxiety sat in Val’s chest. This was why Josh was worried about Savannah. It was her husband. “Is anyone looking out for her? Does she have police protection? If he tried to kill her and no one suspects him—”
“I know they have a guard at the hospital, but I don’t know how to warn them about Anderson.”
Val pressed the coffee down. “Tell them about the affair?”
Sully raised his eyebrows. “And how do I know about that exactly? Did Savannah confide in me? A guy she hardly knows?”
Val opened her mouth. Closed it. Hmmm.
“Just… tell them you heard rumors up here. They got into a big fight last week at the coffee shop.”