“Public intoxication.” Carl slid the key in the lock. “Or public nuisance.”
He unlocked the door and she stepped out of the room, a pitiful figure in a housedress, gray hair sticking out in all directions and a gaunt face. Her attention quickly turned to Jeremy. She frowned and stomped her foot.
“I’m not going with him.”
“Mrs. Hightree, you don’t have a choice.”
She flared her thin nostrils at them and shook her head. “I have choices. I can walk out of here. I can head on home without his help.”
Heat crawled up Jeremy’s cheeks. After a lifetime of this, a guy should be used to it. It wasn’t as if her behavior took people by surprise. What did surprise him was how old she looked, and how bad. He’d seen her less than a week ago and she hadn’t looked this old.
She had been a pretty woman twenty years ago. Thirty-one years ago she had obviously turned some heads. He pushed that thought aside because now wasn’t the time to get caught in the muck.
“Mom, we’re going home.”
“Janie, my name is Janie.”
He grabbed her arm, loose flesh and bones. “Right, Jane.”
He hadn’t called her mom since he was ten and he’d found her passed out in the yard when he came home from school. That had been enough to take the word “Mom” right out of his vocabulary.
“You don’t have to hold me. I’m not going to run.”
“No, but you might fall down.”
She wobbled a little, as if to prove his point. “There’s nothing wrong with me.”
Jeremy shot a look back at Carl. The cop stood behind them, sorry written all over his face. “Thanks, Carl. You’re sure there weren’t any expenses this time?”
“Not this time. Do you want me to call the hospital in Grove? Maybe she should be seen?”
“I’m fine, I said.” She jerked her arm free from his hand. “I don’t need either of you holding me or telling me what to do. I just need to go home.”
“I’ll take her home.” Jeremy opened the door and motioned his mother through. “See you later.”
“Yeah, we’ll see you around. Maybe we can meet for lunch at the Mad Cow tomorrow?”
“Right, and you can try to talk me out of what you all think is a big mistake.” Jeremy smiled, and Carl turned a few shades of red, right to the roots of his straw-colored hair. “I’ll meet you for lunch, but if everyone was so worried about this church, why didn’t you all do something sooner?”
“Yeah, I guess you’ve got a point there, Jeremy. Maybe we just thought it would always be there.”
“It would have fallen in, Carl.”
Carl stood in the doorway while Jeremy held on to his mother to keep her from falling off the sidewalk. “My grandpa goes up there once a month to check on the place. I think a lot of the older people in town would love to have it opened up again, but nobody had the money and the younger families have moved away.”
“Call me and we’ll talk over burgers at Vera’s.”
Carl nodded. “I’d appreciate that.”
Jeremy escorted his mom out the door and down the sidewalk. She weaved and leaned against him. Tires on pavement drew his attention to the road. Tim Cooper. Yeah, they’d have to face each other sooner or later. They hadn’t talked since the day Jeremy learned the truth. The day Tim Cooper wrote him a check, because it was the right thing to do.
Jeremy opened the door on the passenger side of the truck. Jane wobbled and her legs buckled. When he tried to lift her up she swatted at his hands.
It took a few minutes but he got her in the seat and buckled up. They headed down the road, toward Back Street but then turned east. The paved country road led to a tiny trailer surrounded by farmland. It had two bedrooms and a front porch that was falling in. More than once he’d tried to get her to move. But this was her house and she didn’t want his money.
It was the only thing she’d ever owned. This trailer was her legacy. He shook his head as he drove down the road. He thought about how he’d envied the Coopers and their big old ranch house.
His mom choked a little and leaned. Great. Her body went limp and she fell sideways. He eased into the driveway of the trailer and pulled the emergency brake. He put the windows down and waited while she got sick on the floor of the truck.
Maybe they would head for the hospital. He pulled her back in the seat and wiped her mouth with the handkerchief he pulled out of his pocket. “Mom, are you with me?”
She shook her head and mumbled that he was as worthless as his father. Yeah, she was with him. He shifted into reverse and glanced in his rearview window. A blue truck pulled in behind him. Great, what he didn’t need was a big dose of sympathy in brown eyes that dragged his heart places he didn’t want to go.
But that’s what he was about to get.
“Leave me here,” his mom mumbled without moving from her prone position on the seat next to him.
“I can’t leave you here. You need help.”
“Since when do you care?”
“I don’t know, since forever, I guess.” And he’d proven it time and again. His mom passed out as Beth rapped on his driver’s side window.
Beth shouldn’t have stopped but she’d seen Jeremy’s truck at the police station. She’d watched in her rearview mirror as he helped his mother down the sidewalk. For a few minutes she’d listened to the smart Beth who insisted she should drive on home and forget it. But the other Beth had insisted she put her heart on the line. And that’s why she was looking through the window of his truck into eyes that were slightly lost and a lot angry.
His window slid down. “Imagine seeing you here.”
“I thought you might need help.”
“No, we’re fine. I’m taking her to the hospital.”
In the seat next to him his mother made a grunting sound that resembled a negative response. Obviously she didn’t want Beth around and she wasn’t interested in going to the hospital.
“Do you want me to ride over there with you?” She regretted the words the minute they were out. No one in their right mind would volunteer. But she had gone and done it.
His mother leaned to the floor again. Jeremy groaned and reached in the backseat of the truck for a towel that he tossed on the floor. “You wouldn’t happen to have a bag or a bucket in your truck, would you?”
“Give me a sec and I’ll check.” Beth hurried back to her truck. She pushed through the contents in the toolbox in the bed of her truck and found a small bucket, a roll of paper towels and a spray bottle of window cleaner.
She returned to the passenger side of Jeremy’s truck and opened the door slowly, carefully. Jane Hightree was passed out, leaning toward her son. Beth handed him the bucket and then she sprayed the floor down and covered it with paper towels.
“Beth, you don’t have to do this.” His voice was quiet and a little tight with emotion. She glanced up as she pulled on leather gloves.
“I don’t mind. I’m good at cleaning up messes.”
“Yeah, well, I usually clean up my own messes.”
She ignored him and cleaned, tossing it all in a bag she’d pulled out from under her truck seat.
“I appreciate the help.” Jeremy reached for the passenger seat belt, pulling it around his mother, even though she remained