Truck Stop Jesus Read online

  “I’d like to help you,” Father Jake said, his voice still slow and calm.

  “You won’t turn me in?”

  “Why don’t you tell me what happened. We’re just talking, remember? When I say I want to help, I mean it.”

  “That’s not an answer. How did you put it? It’s a yes-or-no question.”

  “This isn’t a confessional, so I’m obligated to report something I hear if it’s illegal, just like anyone else. That being said, I still want to help. I promise you can trust me to do the right thing, whatever it is.”

  “Jake, what if you heard about a hypothetical situation?” Doc said. “You know, just in a passing conversation at a diner?”

  “C’mon, Doc, I already said I wanted to help.”

  Doc turned toward Paradise. “Nobody’s going to turn you in. Hypothetically, what happened?”

  The front door opened again, but this time Paradise didn’t look up. She felt safe sitting with the two men.

  “Okay. Let’s just say there was a hypothetical stepfather who couldn’t keep his very real and very creepy hands to himself. And what if he tried to force himself on his stepdaughter when she was changing in a pool house? Wouldn’t she be justified, for instance—hypothetically—if she whacked him over the head with a lamp and then sent his very expensive Porsche over a cliff? Hypothetically, I mean?”

  “You’re serious?” Doc looked surprised but not at all unhappy.

  “Hypothetically serious.”

  “What model?” Doc said.

  “Lamp?”

  “Porsche.”

  “Panamera. Brand new.”

  Doc whistled between his teeth.

  A wrinkle of concern formed between Father Jake’s eyes. “Did you report him? For the assault?”

  “No. He’s a big, hypothetical psychiatrist in Beverly Hills, and he beat me to the police. He told them it was all me. That I made a pass at him, if you can believe it. And that I got mad and wrecked his car when he turned me down.”

  “You could tell them the truth,” Father Jake said. “That’s always a good place to start.”

  “It’s his word against mine. And Beverly Hills justice tends to land on the side of the stepfather with the fattest wallet.”

  “So you’re on the lam,” Doc said, sounding very Cagney.

  An unintended smile brushed her lips. Doc returned it.

  “Does anyone know you’re here?” Father Jake asked.

  “No. I didn’t tell anyone where I was going. Arnie’s panicking, and my friend Ashleigh is worried that I can’t handle America. Other than that, I doubt anyone even cares I’m gone. Except maybe creepy Burt, hypothetically.”

  “Then you should be safe, at least for now. Let me see what I can do. I can talk to someone for you. If your stepfather assaulted you, he should answer for it.”

  “He did, and he won’t. He never has. You don’t know Burt. He doesn’t know the word quit. He won’t stop with police. It’s personal for him. An insult to his maleness. But thanks for trying, Father Jake the Priest. I feel better talking to you. You’re very good at this.”

  “It must be hard,” Doc said, “being alone in a strange place.”

  “Yes. Harder than I thought it would be.”

  “So, what part are you up for?”

  “Scarlett in the new Gone with the Wind.”

  “No kidding? That’s huge.”

  Paradise shook her head. “My agent says it’s in the bag, but he says that about everything from big parts to toothpaste commercials. It’s a one-in-a-million long shot. Although the toothpaste commercial came through, come to think of it.”

  “I think you’d be a perfect Scarlett.”

  “You don’t even know me.”

  “I know enough. So, Paradise Jones. Paradise, Arizona. Coincidence?”

  “My father was an actor,” she said. “He grew up here. He named me after this town. So I came because I wanted to see it.”

  “Wait,” Doc said. “Your dad was Gregory Jones?”

  “Yes.”

  The men looked at each other.

  “Why?” she asked.

  “This may sound like a strange question,” Father Jake said, “and I hope you don’t find it insensitive, but your father, did he ever mention a coin? An old one? Gold?”

  “You mean the Dos Escudos?” Paradise said.

  Father Jake’s mouth opened.

  “That’s right,” Doc said. “The Dos Escudos. You know it? Your father told you about it?”

  “He never told me about it, but he left it to me. To tell you the truth, that’s another reason I came. A man at a coin shop told me there was another one like mine. Here, in a museum. And they went together somehow.”

  Doc tipped his coffee cup toward Father Jake. “You mean his museum. You’re counseling with the head honcho museum man, although the other coin’s usually behind the museum. In my trailer.”

  “Your trailer? Why do you have it?”

  “Because I found it. And now you found me. Like in a movie. It was meant to be.”

  “Like I said before, you need to learn to focus.”

  Father Jake touched her arm. “Listen, this could be very important. Where is your coin now? Do you have it with you?”

  “Because of the treasure, you mean?”

  Father Jake’s eyebrows arched. “You know about that too? How?”

  “The man at the coin shop told me—a strange little man. And I looked it up on the Internet at the library in Phoenix. There are lots of articles about it. Do you think the treasure is real?”

  “No one knows. Probably not, but even if it isn’t, the coins are a substantial historical find. I’d love to see them in the same room.”

  “I don’t have it here. I left it at my room. I’m staying at the Venus Motel.”

  “No one’s seen these coins together in nearly three hundred years. This is a small miracle. Tomorrow, then. Could you bring the coin to the mission tomorrow?” Father Jake said.

  Doc reached into his pocket. Gold glinted in the air as he flipped a coin and popped it on the table with a sharp smack. Just like hers. She picked it up.

  “My good luck charm,” Doc said. “Nice night for a drive. What do you think?”

  “C’mon, little brother, don’t push it. It can wait till morning. Heaven knows it’s waited this long. And you don’t invite yourself to a lady’s room,” Father Jake said.

  Paradise turned the coin in her fingers. For the first time in days, Burt faded to the back of her mind. His creepy, tanned face crowded out by newfound curiosity. She liked these two brothers, and the thought of her dark motel room depressed her. “I’m game, fellas. Let’s do it. It’s not like I have a busy nightlife. I’m on the lam, remember?”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Beginning of the World

  Doc followed Paradise’s taillights as they headed out of town down First Avenue. Out past the commercial district and a tract of new homes, the landscape gave way to scrub oak and sage. First Avenue turned into Juniper Road and wound down the mountain. She drove fast, and Doc had to push his truck to keep up. At Highway 30, the taillights turned left—no blinker—and the moonlit desert stretched out to the west like an infinite sea floor. The moon shone full, lighting the wispy clouds stretching horizon to horizon. So bright that Doc could just make out the shadows of the San Angelo mountain range miles away to the south.

  Jake spent the drive talking about the coins and sounding almost excited—at least as excited as Jake ever got. Doc tried to track, but his mind took a hard right down another road and it had nothing to do with Spanish coins.

  Paradise Jones changed everything.

  As of tonight, the world was bigger and spun faster. More solid and tenuous at the same time. It had become, in a single moment, a world where a girl like Paradise Jones could walk through the door of Shorty’s Café and Restaurant. He went over the details again. Her fingers, long and perfect, nervous as they toyed with the spoon in her coffee cup.
The little hollow at the base of her throat that flexed when she spoke. The way she talked and how her mind flitted through sentences like a butterfly trying to find a place to land. Even how she dismissed him so handily. He laughed aloud in the dark cab.

  “What?” Jake said.

  Doc glanced at him. His brother’s face shone dull green in the dashboard glow.

  “What, what?” Doc replied.

  “What do you think? What if?”

  “What if what?”

  Jake shook his head and eyed Doc from beneath his hat brim. “You haven’t been listening to a word I’ve said.”

  “Of course, I’m listening. What if what?”

  “What if it’s real? The story? What if it leads to something? It’s a possibility.”

  “Oh, that. Yeah. What if?”

  Doc’s attention focused on the taillights now a quarter mile ahead, but he felt Jake’s stare. No, scratch that. Father Jake’s stare.

  “Don’t do that,” Doc said.

  “Do what?”

  “Look at me like that.”

  “Like what?”

  “You know like what. Like a priest.”

  “I am a priest.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Be careful, Doc, that’s all. You just met the girl. Don’t get ahead of yourself.”

  “Weren’t you the one who wouldn’t stop telling me I should go talk to her? That I needed a distraction? What happened to that?”

  “I just want you to be careful. She’s in trouble. Maybe a lot of trouble. Law trouble. Don’t get in over your head.”

  Doc let a half mile or so slip beneath the truck’s wheels before he answered. “Yeah. She’s in trouble. But you heard her story. She’s alone. And it wasn’t her fault.”

  “We don’t know her, Doc. Maybe it’s not the whole story. I’m just saying, go slow, that’s all. You’re not in control. It’s not baseball. This is not Fenway, and she’s not the Green Monster.”

  “That’s what Mickey told me the other day just before I hit that bomb.”

  “I’m serious, Doc.”

  “I know you are.”

  “The Green Monster,” Doc said, half to himself.

  “What?”

  Doc clapped Jake on the shoulder. “I said I’ll be careful, Father Jake the Priest. Don’t you worry about a thing.”

  The Venus Motel had been a Paradise landmark since the early ’40s. The motel’s sign, a two-story, flashing neon Venus, stood guard over Highway 30 and beckoned travelers for a mile in either direction. Once rundown and half forgotten, a couple from Tucson recently purchased the property and gave it a much needed facelift. The motel lounge and retro piano and music bar filled to capacity most nights with locals and weary pilgrims alike. Tonight, a biker club joined the fray, parking their Harley Davidsons tight in among the pickups, BMWs, and Toyota Priuses. Doc followed Paradise as she rolled past them to the end of the motel and parked in front of room thirty-one. He threw the truck into park, opened the door, and slid out.

  In the pool across the parking lot, a young mom and dad laughed and splashed with their daughter, all three glowing blue-green in the shimmering light. The sight brought a pang of the old familiar restlessness. Paradise Jones standing next to her Olds Eighty-Eight drove it away like Jesus with his scourge.

  “Home sweet home,” she said.

  Doc’s world fell around him when heard the sad edge in her voice. Then she smiled and built it again.

  “Isn’t she beautiful?” Paradise’s face turned to the glow of the smiling Venus, neon light playing across her features.

  “I guess I never thought about it,” Jake said. “How did you find this place?”

  “Where else? It’s perfect,” she said simply.

  Jake nodded as if this made perfect sense. “How long have you been here?”

  “A few days. Not long. I love it.”

  “And you haven’t come to the museum?”

  She crossed her arms, leaned back against the Olds and lifted her shoulders. “One day I just sat by the pool. Then another I drove out into the desert. It’s so quiet out there, isn’t it? Like the beginning of the world. Like there’s nothing else. Only possibility.”

  “I see,” Jake said, though Doc knew he didn’t.

  “I started to go to the museum today, but by the time I got to town it was getting late. I walked around the park for a while. Under that big tree.”

  “The oak,” Jake said.

  “I suppose it was. Then I got hungry and went to the diner, but I saw you and got nervous and wasn’t hungry anymore. It’s a good thing, don’t you think? That I went in?”

  “Absolutely,” Doc said.

  Paradise glanced at him, then back to Jake.

  “Why didn’t you bring the coin with you if you were going to visit the museum?” Jake said.

  “I don’t know. I don’t think I was going to tell anybody I even had it. I wanted to see the other one first. But then you were so nice, so I told you.”

  Spanish guitar from the lounge floated across the balmy evening. The Venus hummed and flickered beneath the glowing desert sky. A beautiful night made even more so with Paradise Jones standing squarely in the middle of the universe.

  “Get it together, man,” Doc mumbled.

  “What’s that, Doc?” Jake said.

  “I said, how about we see the coins,” Doc said.

  Paradise moved to the door of room thirty-one, then fished through her purse and came out with a key. “I love that they have real keys here. Not those card things. And real Cokes in the machine.”

  She moved to insert it into the doorknob, but the door swung open at her touch, creaking slightly on its hinges. She took a startled step back. “That’s funny. I know I locked it.”

  Doc moved forward and placed a hand on her shoulder. She didn’t move away, but he felt her tense.

  “Let me take a look,” he said.

  She nodded and moved another three steps away from the door.

  Doc felt around until he found the light switch. It took a few seconds. Lower than it should have been. A table lamp next to the bed flicked on. The bed had been stripped, blankets, sheets and pillow scattered. A large, red suitcase lay open and upside down on the floor. Clothes sprawled over the otherwise bare mattress. The nightstand drawer hung open, and a Gideon Bible rested among some of its own torn-out pages.

  “Oh, no.” Paradise said.

  Jake stepped in behind her. “What in the world?”

  “It’s Burt. I know it’s him. He found me.” Paradise wrapped her arms around herself as if trying to make her body as small as possible.

  “It could have been random,” Doc said. It sounded hollow, even to him.

  “We need to call the police,” Jake said.

  Paradise touched his arm. “No. Please. It’s okay. I just need to go. I’ll find somewhere else to go. The police will take me back to LA. To Burt. I can’t go back. Not until it’s all sorted out, and I know he won’t hurt me.”

  “It’s all right. No one’s taking you anywhere,” Doc said.

  Behind Paradise, Jake’s brow furrowed, and he shook his head at Doc.

  Paradise moved into the bathroom and Doc followed. A flower-patterned makeup case lay on its side next to the sink, its contents scattered across the Formica counter. Paradise shuffled through them frantically.

  “It’s gone,” she said finally. “It’s not here.”

  “What’s gone?” Jake said, standing in the bathroom doorway.

  “My dad’s coin. It’s gone. He got it—Burt. How could he know? Why would he even care?”

  “You’re sure it’s gone?” Doc said, studying her profile.

  She didn’t turn but continued to stare straight ahead. Doc followed her gaze. A tube of lipstick, the same shade Paradise wore, lay uncapped by the faucet. Above it, again the same shade, the mirror had a smeared kiss mark and next to it a pink, scrawled message.

  C + H.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN
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  We’ll Leave the Light on For Ya

  Hollister scratched his arms while he counted to one hundred in his head. The arm-scratching, he knew, was psychosomatic, left over from a run-in with bedbugs ten years ago at a Motel 6 in Montana. The counting, however, constituted a regular blocking-out-Crystal’s-voice exercise and wasn’t psychosomatic at all. In fact, it very well may have saved her life on more than one occasion.

  “I hate Motel 6,” he said when he could force a word edgewise into her current diatribe—something about interval training. He’d gotten to seventy-three in his head so far and had no clue what she was talking about.

  Crystal flopped her body onto the polyester bedspread, picked at a thread, and showed her shark-teeth. “It’s not a Motel 6. It’s a Motel 5.”

  “I never heard of a Five. I heard of a Six. And a Super 8, but not a five anything.”

  “Yeah, well, this is a Motel 5. Get over it.”

  Hollister scratched harder. “That’s one worse than a Six.” He started counting again, picturing the numbers floating up into a cloudless sky as big balloons.

  His cell rang. Old-fashioned ring-tone, the loudest one. Lately he couldn’t hear the others.

  “Yeah?” he said.

  “Where are you?” Dr. Simmons’ voice rankled.

  Hollister started his count over at one and released a balloon. “Arizona.”

  “Where in Arizona?”

  Two …

  “Who is it?” Crystal mouthed, elbow on the bed and head propped on her hand.

  Hollister shook his head and held up a finger. Crystal hopped to her knees and mimicked him, holding up her own finger. A forty-year-old kindergartener.

  Hollister turned his back on her. “Paradise. No, let me rephrase that. Middle-of-nowhere-godforsaken-you-can-see-hell-just-down-the-road-from-here Paradise, Arizona. In a Motel 5—no joke. A five, not a six.”

  Crystal disco-danced around in front of him and air-punched twice, coming within half an inch of his nose. “Who is it?” she mouthed again.

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” Simmons said. “She’s in Paradise? That’s where she went? So you’ve got her then?”

  “Not exactly, but it’s just a matter of time. She’s here. We found her motel, but we missed her.”