Excerpt of a new Texas suspense novel<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We Are All the Same in the Dark: A Novel<\/em> <\/span><\/strong><\/a>by <\/span>Julia Heaberlin<\/span><\/strong><\/a>.<\/span><\/strong> Copyright \u00a9 2020 by the author and reprinted by permission of Ballantine Books.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Chapter<\/span><\/strong> 9<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Wy<\/span><\/span>att is sucking blood off his thumb. \u201cOpened a cut,\u201d he grumbles.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I\u2019m staring at the flattened ground and wondering if the thumb he\u2019s sucking is the one that left a mark on the neck of the girl in the documentary. On the way over, I just straight out asked him. He said that he didn\u2019t expect that kind of shit from me.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

He wasn\u2019t lying about Angel and the dandelions. Here they are, dying, laid neatly in a five-foot oval, like tiny dead dolls with fluffy heads of hair. It sends a shiver through me, hard to do in a bare field in July even with the sun halfway down. One edge of the circle is disturbed by a single footprint. I\u2019m comparing it to the shape of Wyatt\u2019s boot.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Pasture, sky, barbed wire. Pasture, sky, barbed wire. Write those three words a hundred thousand times. That\u2019s what it feels like on this stretch of Texas highway known as Flat Belly by old ranchers and as Siesta Highway to the long-haul truckers it hypnotizes.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Even<\/span><\/span> so, it didn\u2019t take long before Wyatt told me where to pull over.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

He said I was lucky that Trumanell marked the spot. He jumped out of the truck and picked a piece of paper out of the barbed wire. Stuck it in his pocket without explaining before spreading a particularly wicked double twist of wire for me to crawl through. He\u2019d done that dozens of times for me before; this was the first time I ever wondered for a second if I\u2019d be coming back.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Now<\/span><\/span> his thumb is sucked dry and he\u2019s rubbing his arm. Bothered. I glance back to the road, a noisy, violent ocean of eighteen-wheelers. At least two hundred feet away. It\u2019s a miracle Wyatt spotted Angel at all. Too much of one?<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Angel couldn\u2019t have stretched a gap in the wire by herself or climbed over even the lowest part of this fence line without scratching herself. Not without years of practice. Not in the thin sundress she was wearing. So she came from another part of the field. Or she was carried over.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

My eyes settle on a lone clump of trees sitting to the west. The trees could be watching. And the telephone poles. Texas ranchers aim drones and long-range night vision cameras at grassy fields these days like they\u2019re surveilling crime in a shopping center parking lot.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The ranchers know that all this heat and sky and emptiness messes with the best of us\u2014that everything that lives under this sun seeks a place to explode. Foal-hungry coyotes, machine-gun freaks, kids who want a place to drink and screw and tip cows.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Angel might be on one of those cameras.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Wyatt<\/span><\/span> is holding out his hand impatiently. \u201cToss me your keys. I\u2019m going back to the truck. I did what you asked. I brought you here. What\u2019s with the look? Think I\u2019ll take off?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I chunk them over reluctantly. I\u2019m not sure which is worse\u2014 checking out this scene alone or with him lurking over my shoulder. \u201cYou may be waiting for me a while,\u201d I say.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been doing that for ten years. Why stop now?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

My eyes follow his taut form until he\u2019s back on the other side of the fence.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I pull out my phone and begin to snap pictures.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The dandelion circle appears on-screen like the outline of a small grave. Ants are traveling down into the black cracks of earth like coal miners. I focus tight on the footprint. I stand back and shoot a broader view of the fence and the field.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I walk a grid pattern until I\u2019m submerged in Indian grass so high it tickles one of my childhood phobias. Disappearing in grass like this is like getting lost at sea, the sun doing the dirty work of the water.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Insects are furiously scraping their body parts together, buzzing at high pitch. A cicada vibrates against my leg, sending the same kind of violent shiver as the first time a boy dropped one down the back of my shirt. I bat it away and spread the grass to the ground, searching for things I want to find and things I\u2019m worried I will.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A backpack, a shoe, a phone, Angel\u2019s false eye with a serial number, any fingerprint of where she came from. Unseeing eyes made of human tissue, decomposing, clouding over like the sky that watches down on them. Any sign at all that Wyatt stumbled into a killing field. Or has turned this into one.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I thread my way out of the weeds. You\u2019d need at least a hundred cops for a good search out here in this choking heat, the sky smoking toward night. I glance back at the pickup, wishing I hadn\u2019t chosen such a dark tint for the windows. The drumbeat of hard rock escaping. Wyatt has always liked the air conditioner blasting on high, the music blasting higher.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I\u2019ve<\/span><\/span> been uneasy about Wyatt\u2019s lack of cooperation ever since I picked him up. He didn\u2019t follow my orders earlier to stay at the house. His pickup was missing from the drive when I got there. I thought he\u2019d finally run. It took a half hour to find him in the west pasture fixing a fence post and another fifteen minutes to convince him to get in the pickup. He didn\u2019t want me there on his land. And every bit of his body language says he doesn\u2019t want to be here, either. There\u2019s very little time left before the sky steals my light. I debate about returning to the truck. I trek toward the trees, skirting the dandelions. Wyatt used to play wildflower games with Trumanell in their fields. Did he reenact one with this girl?<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The dandelions, they\u2019re a problem for him. For me, <\/em>if I\u2019m pre- tending to be an objective cop. Wyatt had an aversion to them he\u2019d never explain. Maybe that works in his favor right now. He over- came that aversion to save a girl.<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I catch a flash of activity just past the clump of live oaks. A crow is cawing, thrashing at something on the ground. I\u2019ve always been wary of crows, ever since my father told me they could remember my face.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The rapid beat of Wyatt\u2019s music is too far away to hear. But it feels like my stump is pulsing with it.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

My stomach churns at the thought of it being another girl, this one not so lucky. I pull out my gun. Pick up the pace.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Three<\/span><\/span> feet from the trees, I heave my dinner into the soil. Not human remains.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Two crows. One is dead. The other, raping it.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I\u2019ve heard of crows copulating with death. Twisted, like humans, since the beginning. The ancient Egyptians left their most beautiful and high-ranking dead women to rot in the sun before burial so no one would rape them.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

There is no explaining.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I aim at the manic flapping. One shot. The bitter crack of it shocks the insects to stillness. When they recover, they\u2019ll find a bloody feast waiting.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I pick my way back carefully. I kneel gracelessly in the circle of dandelions and do something I haven\u2019t done for ten years, since God did and did not answer my plea for help on a black road when I was sixteen.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I pray.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I pray that Trumanell was not left to rot in a field like a Grecian queen.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I pray that if someone\u2019s hunting Angel, I\u2019ll find the hunter first.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The sun has dropped neatly into its hole. I can barely make out the shape of my truck in the dark. The barbed wire fence has virtually disappeared. I stop, breathless, inches from its tiny knives.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Devil\u2019s<\/span><\/span> rope. That\u2019s how my uncle described barbed wire from the pulpit\u2014evil that was tricky, almost invisible, until you were already caught. Auschwitz, Dachau, Buchenwald\u2014the most unspeakable evidence of man\u2019s capacity for sin.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I maneuver the fence easily. It\u2019s not even close to the obstacles I\u2019ve used to test my leg. No one expects my agility, an advantage as a cop. Nine times out of ten, the bad guys aim for my prosthetic leg. It is my good leg they should be thinking about if they really want to hurt me. Take out that one, and it\u2019s game over.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The silhouette of Wyatt\u2019s head in the truck window is not visible. The highway, so desperate an hour ago, is already going to sleep.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cWho did you kill?\u201d It slithers at me from the dark.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

My hand jumps to my gun and rests there. Wyatt, out of the truck. Close. I can\u2019t make out his face in the shadows. But his mint gum, I can almost taste it.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cJesus, Wyatt,\u201d I say shakily. \u201cGive a girl some warning. I killed a bird. A very evil bird.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cIf you say so,\u201d he says. \u201cYou\u2019re the cop. Cops are the deciders. Let\u2019s go. Trumanell is going to be worried. I didn\u2019t tell her I\u2019d be gone this long.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

If<\/span><\/span> he\u2019d<\/span><\/span> just<\/span><\/span> stopped<\/span><\/span> at<\/span><\/span> let\u2019s<\/span><\/span><\/em> <\/em>go<\/span><\/span><\/em>.<\/span><\/span> If<\/span><\/span> Trumanell\u2019s<\/span><\/span> name<\/span><\/span> wasn\u2019t<\/span><\/span> dropped in the air like a casual match.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cAre<\/span><\/span> you<\/span><\/span> fucking with me?\u201d My voice is low, barely restrained. \u201cWhat do you mean? I feel like you\u2019re fucking with me<\/em>.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, are you fucking with me<\/em>? About this place? The dandelions? About Trumanell? Do you really believe she is in the here and now, picking flowers, washing dishes, wearing her hair down, singing Adele, free as a bird, quoting goddamn Shakespeare and Mister Rogers to keep you from trying to kill yourself and join her?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t say she\u2019s free,\u201d he says, after a second.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A mockingbird calls out in the dark. It could be confused about the time of day. It could be warning all the other birds that there is a killer out here.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Wyatt<\/span><\/span> steps forward. The earth folds in like a box. All that exists is the foot of space between us. I\u2019m struck by his face, like always. Tonight, I see the shadow of Trumanell. I see the kind of looks that make you royalty in a small town no matter what you came from.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to ask what you\u2019ve always wanted to ask,\u201d Wyatt says. \u201cWhich is whether I killed True.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Then he disappears in the white, white light.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

We Are All the Same in the Dark: A Novel<\/em> <\/span><\/strong><\/a>by <\/span>Julia Heaberlin<\/span><\/strong><\/a>.<\/span><\/strong> Copyright \u00a9 2020 by the author and reprinted by permission of Ballantine Books.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Excerpt of a new Texas suspense novel<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1098,813,830,839,843,812,936,841],"class_list":["post-2199","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-excerpt","tag-lone-star-literary-life","tag-lonestarliterarycom","tag-mystery","tag-suspense","tag-texas-author","tag-texasbook","tag-thriller"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonestar.a1professionals.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonestar.a1professionals.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonestar.a1professionals.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonestar.a1professionals.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonestar.a1professionals.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2199"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lonestar.a1professionals.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonestar.a1professionals.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2199"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonestar.a1professionals.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2199"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonestar.a1professionals.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}