Under the Wild Wyoming Skies

Those drug store pantyhose Diana wore that night in the barn? The crotch was intact. Meaning that she and Boyd never had a chance to complete their evening together. Upon greater scrutiny, the state forensic lab found wood fibers embedded in the nylon threads around the knees that were consistent with the wood from which the pallets were made. They also found semen on the back of the left leg, exactly like the ones I saw on similar hose in her room months earlier. It matched Vin's DNA.

What about that lone woman's stocking? The one McConaughey swore when he'd find its match, he'd solve the case.

One thing was for sure. It wasn't Diana's.

Bobby Bosch told detectives that a few weeks earlier they drove to Gilbert to buy drugs. At a truck stop, after they made their purchase, a lot lizard walked up to them. Bobby said the girl told them her name was 'Dorothy' but he didn't know where she came from. He said she told them she was eighteen. After she performed oral sex on both of them, Vin decided he wasn't going to pay up. 'That's the only thing women are good for' Vin reportedly said. Dorothy slapped him, it would be the last time she slapped anyone.

They drove her to the cabin where they promised her more money and drugs in exchange for sex. Once there, Vincent Cookson started to beat the girl, and when he knocked her unconscious, he took off one of her stockings and strangled her. Why did he keep it? Bobby said he liked women that wore stockings. It was the only thing he liked about women. According to Bobby, Vin liked to masturbate on woman's nylons, while they were wearing them. In a way, that explained why Diana's pantyhose was tossed around her tiny room. She apparently modeled them for Vincent Cookson without her knowledge, and when he was done, he'd leave a little deposit.

They dumped Dorothy's body in a shallow grave. When Bobby led them to the site, the detectives found the decomposed remains of Dorothy, along with the missing stocking still wrapped around her neck. McConaughey was right about solving the case when he found the matching nylon.

It was far from over. While the murder of Boyd Nelson had been solved, the trial of Vincent Cookson and Bobby Bosch had yet to begin.

*******Chapter Twenty-One********

It had been over a year since that spring day when our lives, along with the rest of our town, changed.

By the main entrance to the school is a small white sign. It reads: Our staff and teachers are trained and armed to use deadly force to protect out children.

Later that summer, after graduation, Diana went into town. I wasn't aware of it until I heard what she had done. Apparently she went to Pete's Barbershop. She had a short denim skirt on, bare legs, and those high-heeled cowboy boots. Supposedly she wore a bright red shirt. She entered the shop, and plopped her foot down between the legs of Homer. She asked him if he'd like to see if she was a natural redhead, reached under her skirt and pulled her panties off. She dropped them in his lap. I guess old Homer couldn't talk. When she unbuttoned her shirt, she asked if he wanted to see her red breast. At that moment, Homer Bennett pissed his pants. That was the end of the rumors about Diana from the boys at the barbershop.

*****************

People change. We all do. Sometimes change happens so slowly you don't notice it. After things calmed down, life went back to what would become our new normal.

I was outside putting the finishing touches to my Ford tractor when Diana came out of the house. I stopped what I was doing and watched as she slowly stepped off the front porch. She stopped and looked about, and then walked over to me. In her hand was a tube of sunscreen. Diana stood there in a pair of short-shorts and bikini top while I applied cream. She told me that she wanted to feel the sun on her skin. Diana had grown tired of hiding.

With some help from our friends and a borrowed seed drill, Diana started that old Ford tractor and planted our first crop of sugar beets.

We all change.

For Vincent Cookson and Bobby Bosch, their lives will change, too.

********Chapter Twenty-Two**********

Diana sat at a desk combing her hair. She had let it grow out and it's a gorgeous flaming red lava that cascades down her shoulders to settle above her breasts. She tried to put some lipstick on, but her hand shook too much.

"You don't need to paint your lips. You look great without it."

She lowered her hand and placed the lipstick on the desk. "I'm scared."

We stayed at a Marriott in downtown Cheyenne, courtesy of the state of Wyoming. The trial had to be moved to the capitol because of all the publicity surrounding the case in our town. The most bizarre thing in all of this? Diana couldn't testify. She had no memory, not even bits and pieces of images that she could recall.

After that day at school, Vincent Cookson said he'd never give up the words he used to control Diana. She'd been in therapy, and the people that she'd been working with decided not to try break though the walls her mind put up. For Diana, they said, that part of her past should remain buried deep in her mind. She and I agreed. It is better to have no memory of those events than nightmares caused by them.

Bobby was the state's witness and that got him out of serious jail time. He pleaded out and had no trial.

Because Bobby Bosch was only fifteen at the time, the judge sentenced him as a juvenile in return for his involvement in the murder of Boyd Nelson and the school shooting. He was to be incarcerated in a juvenile center until he turned twenty-one then four more years in a halfway house. He would be on probation for the next ten years after he completes the halfway house stint. At the urging of Diana, Bobby Bosch will not have to register as a sex offender.

Vincent Cookson wanted to fight the charges, but once the trial began and the testimony of Bobby Bosch came out, along with tons of forensic evidence, Vincent Cookson had a change of heart. To avoid the death penalty, Vincent used his only trump card.

To keep from being hung, Vincent said he'd take them to another gravesite. At the bottom of an old dry well on his dad's property detectives found the remains of yet another woman. It was Vincent Cookson's mother; the one that everyone thought had run off with a truck driver. I don't know if charges will be made against his dad or to Vin. If I were a betting man, I'd bet both had something to do with the death of his mother. The apples don't fall too far from the tree.

************

We were there that day for the sentencing of Vincent Cookson.

Diana sat on the chair and looked at herself in the mirror. I came up behind her and slipped the straps of her bra off of her shoulders. Gently I massaged her back and neck. I still love to see and touch her bare back.

She put her arms on the desk and rested her head on them. "Oh, I wish it was all over."

I continued to give her shoulders a rub, then I wiggled the straps back onto her shoulders. "It will be soon. We better get going."

I sat on the bed tying my tie as I watched her get dressed. She smiled at me while she pulled on a pair of black thong panties. Next went a pair of expensive pantyhose I had purchased for her. They were light in color and I didn't paint over the birthmark on her leg. When she fastened the zipper on her blue skirt, you could see some of the birthmark showing through her hose. It was perfectly okay with me, and with her.

She sat beside me and slipped on a pair of conservative black pumps. "I like my higher ones better," Diana said.

"So do I." It made her smile and I liked it when my Diana smiled.

I helped her get the shirttails of her blouse tucked around her waist. When I reached for my jacket, she stopped me. "Leave it here. We'll end up looking like a pair of schoolteachers."

Hand in hand we walked to the elevators and then out of the hotel.

***********

The courtroom was packed. The press was certainly there in numbers, as well as dozens of our friends. Diana sat and bounced her knee. When the judge asked if anyone would like to read a victim impact statement Diana rose and walked to the center of the courtroom.

She told the judge how her life had been destroyed not only by Vincent Cookson and Bobby Bosch, but also from Lee McConaughey. How she could never walk through town without whispers and innuendo shadowing her. She wanted Vincent Cookson to be sentenced to the full extent of the law for what he done to her. She demanded a public apology from Lee McConaughey.

Diana returned to my side, and I squeezed her fingers tight.

The judge sentenced Vincent Cookson to five life terms without the possibility for parole for the death of Boyd Nelson, the death of his mother, and the unknown woman found in the grave, kidnapping, and sexual assault for the girls he held hostage in the school attack. There were ten counts of rape against Vin for what he did to Diana. Deep down inside, I bet there were more than ten. We'll never know. All in all, it took almost ten minutes for the judge to read the jury's decisions on all the counts against him.

With the dropping of the gavel, it was over. Diana turned and buried her face on my chest as she wept.

"It's over, Diana, It's over..."

******Chapter Twenty-Three********

Diana and I have harvested two crops of sugar beets since Vincent Cookson's trial.

Diana had been right all along about Wyoming. A sense of serenity surrounds me now. A peaceful easiness filled my soul. I now look forward to the evenings and the quite solitude that Diana and I have together. I have found peace within myself.

I gave the swing a gentle push, sat back and reflected on my life. Soon, I heard the familiar sound of Diana's shoes as she walked over to me. She had nothing but a smile on her face and her bra and panties; I love to see her like that.

She sat next to me and I slipped the straps of her bra off her shoulders. I'm so in love with Diana, and it was moments like this that I'll remember with such fondness the rest of my life. We would kiss and pet each other. My hands still enjoyed the smoothness of her bare back and shoulders.

New York seemed light years away. We would sit and talk. As the mountains peaks turned autumn gold with the fading light of day, Diana would add another mark in her journal, as another day of sobriety for me had come to a close.

**********Epilog*********

"Push! Push!"

"I am pushing!" Diana's breaths were coming short and fast.

"Breathe! Breathe!"

She squeezed my hands hard. "If you ever touch me again with that thing, I'll break it off!"

"Breathe, Diana, push!"

"I see the head," the doctor said, "One more, push, push, push, push!"

Diana screamed.

"Would you like to cut the cord?"

"You betcha!"

With the snip of a pair of scissors, and a smack on her rear, a new life began. I went back to Diana. "Our first child."

"Mister and Misses Abbey, you have a daughter."

A nurse placed our daughter in Diana's arms. "Oh shit," I said.

"Why? What's wrong?"

"Another redhead. Two red-haired women in my life now."

"My mother's middle name was Isabelle, after my grandmother. I'd like to name our daughter Isabelle."

"Isabelle Abbey it is." I kissed my daughter on the forehead, and then I kissed my wife. "I know there is a waiting room about to explode if I don't tell your dad and brothers."

*******

Through the windows of the waiting room I saw that it was filled to capacity. Diana's dad looked like he had worn the carpet down to the subfloor. I opened the door.

"Jack, how is my daughter doing."

"Grandpa, my wife is doing find."

"Grandpa?"

"You have a granddaughter named Isabelle, and both her and your daughter are perfectly fine.

I watched as that old man's eye filled with tears. He sat down on the nearest chair and wiped the tears from his face. "Did you hear that boys? You're all uncles now."

*********

I believe in fate. Floyd and the boys at the barbershop don't call it the Bookmen farm anymore. Nope, it's now the Abbey farm, and it's where Diana and I will raise our children with all the love we have under the wild Wyoming skies...