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“I found God.”
The deputy heaved a weary sigh and leaned back in his desk chair. “Your comic timing needs work.”
“Speaking of timing, how soon can I get out of here?”
Rawlins reacted to that with a show of temper. “I don’t want to be here, either, you know. The sun is about to come up on Thanksgiving, and my wife is mad as hell because a passel of kinfolk is descending at noon, and I forgot to pick up evaporated milk last night. Or maybe it was condensed milk. Whichever, she can’t finish her pie-baking, and I’m catching the blame.” He brought his chair upright like he was about to launch. “All because of you.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“No?”
“No. Well, except for keeping my plane aloft long enough to spare Dr. O’Neal’s life, but good flying doesn’t seem to go very far with you people.”
“You ever been arrested?”
Rye hitched his chin toward the stack of paperwork. “What’s it say?”
Rawlins thumbed through several sheets. “Says disturbing the peace.”
“When and where, specifically?”
“That’s rather the point,” Rawlins returned dryly. “All over the place.” He scanned more sheets. “Says drunkenness.”
“Guilty. San Diego. Bad batch of tequila. Spent the night in the drunk tank, which was a lot more luxurious than the motel the skinflint client had agreed to cover. At least I knew whose pee it was on the floor.”
“Reno, Nevada. Assault in a hotel room.”
“You’re reading it wrong. I filed the complaint. He assaulted me.”
“He?”
“She failed to mention she had a husband.”
Rawlins snuffled and shook his head. “Man. When you bottomed out, you bottomed out good, didn’t you?”
“I’m an overachiever.”
The deputy wasn’t amused. “Who won? You or the husband?”
“I threatened to throw him out the tenth-floor window if he didn’t back off.”
“Were you bluffing?”
“We’ll never know. He backed off before I was tested.”
Rawlins studied him over his cup of coffee as he took another drink, then said, “You’re lying.”
“I’ll swear under oath that it was the tenth floor.”
“You’re lying when you say you don’t know what’s in that box of Dr. O’Neal’s.”
“I don’t.”
“Or why Brady White was attacked.”
“No idea.”
“That’s a crock of shit, Mr. Mallett.”
