Page 79 of Real Sexy
Either way, I’d be really grateful if you’d make sure this letter gets to Ripley Fischer.She always deserved better than everyone calling her mama a whore, but at least this way she’ll know it wasn’t true.I’m not the type to be unfaithful.I’m better than that.
All I want is for my baby to have a life where she can hold her head high and be proud of where she came from.
If something happens to me, all you need to do is look close to home.Frank is on a hair trigger, and I’ve always wondered if he’d just push me down the stairs one day and be done with it.But I’m too useful to put out of commission permanently, I suspect.Then there’s Laurelyn waiting in the wings to step into my place.She always wanted what I have, so my leaving should make her really happy.She’s welcome to Frank, since she always said he should’ve been hers to begin with anyway.
I’m done.
—Rhonda Fischer
P.S.Tell my girl I love her.She’s the best thing that ever happened to me.
Tears are runningdown Ripley’s face when she meets my gaze in the darkness of the bar.
“She ...she wasn’t ...”Her words are interrupted by a hiccup.“How could I not have known?All this time?I thought—”
The lights to the bar flip on, momentarily blinding us both.
“You thought exactly what we all thought.”
42
Ripley
Aunt Laurelyn comestoward Boone and me, a gun in her hand.
“And what everyone else is going to keep on thinkin’.So just drop that right on the floor and back up.Then you’re gonna tell me where that diamond ring is Brandy said you stashed here.”
My brain is working overtime, trying to put the pieces together.
Mama thought Laurelyn wanted Pop.Pop was out in the bar when she was killed ...and as far as I know, the cops never questioned my aunt about the murder.
“Why?”I breathe the word.
Laurelyn waves the gun.“I didn’t open it up to question-and-answer time.Now, give me whatever it is you’ve got there, and tell me where the damned ring is.”
All the saliva in my mouth dries up as I focus on the barrel of the old pistol, and memories come crashing together in my brain.It’s the gun Pop always kept behind the bar.He used to let me watch him clean it sometimes.
It went missing when Mama was murdered and was never found.The cops presumed it was the murder weapon, which is why they took Pop in for questioning, even though he was making drinks when the murder happened.
“Where did you get the gun, Laurelyn?”
My aunt centers it on me.“Been carrying it around a long, long time.”
I don’t even have to ask her if she did it.I know she did.And then she hugged me afterward and bought me a goddamned Happy Meal.
“Why?She was leaving anyway.If you wanted Pop, she was going to let you have him.”
Boone stills beside me, and I can almost hear him cursing me in his brain.
“I didn’t know that!I didn’t know until we found a damned packed bag upstairs and it was already done!”
“But how?I was the first one inside, and there was no one else in the bathroom.”
None of it makes any sense.When I skidded to a halt on the tile, there was only Mama and Gil, dead on the floor.
Laurelyn shakes her head at me and laughs.“Says who?I jumped on the toilet in the stall and closed the door.When you ran out—”
“You snuck out and pretended to break down when you saw them.”
