Tommy's Mom

by Linda O. Johnston

  Al’s gruff face lightened. “I don’t know, Holly, but it just might work.”

  “Do you have any other ideas for figuring out what he’s looking for so I don’t have to go through that?”

  “Let me think about it,” Al said.

  “All right, but if I don’t have any better ideas, I’m liable to stick pennies on my windshield this evening.”

  “From what you say, the guy seems pretty sure you know what he’s after.”

  “I don’t,” she said firmly.

  “Okay, but… Anyway, lay off the pennies for now.”

  Holly went back into the house. She hated to think that Al was part of all that had happened, but if she got another phone call again this quickly, and this time the creep told her what he wanted, she would turn the information over to Gabe—including what she’d said to Al. And if she didn’t hear from the caller again today, she’d do the same thing with Dolph and Bruce on different days.

  In the meantime, she didn’t put pennies on the dashboard. Jimmy Hernandez might see them. And if she got the call today without the pennies in place, she’d know Al was involved.

  Yes, she was playing with fire. She was going against what Gabe and she talked about, since the plan was hers, not theirs.

  Sure, she could just take Tommy and leave town, but where could they go? Not to her parents, certainly. And Tommy and she had protection here, though she still didn’t know just who they needed protection from.

  No, she didn’t want to run. Nor did she want to live in fear. She needed to get this over with—whatever it was.

  In the middle of the afternoon, Evangeline called. “Holly, we need some costumes altered and a couple of new things. Can you come to the rehearsal tonight to see about them?”

  “Sure.” But since she would be preoccupied while she was there, she called Edie at work. “Can you come along and stay close to Tommy for me again?” Holly asked.

  “Sure,” Edie agreed immediately. “I enjoyed my last sneak preview of the show.”

  “I doubt you saw much, what with running after Tommy.”

  “That’s okay. He’s a show himself,” Edie said with a laugh.

  Despite her planning—and her trepidation—Holly did not get the anticipated phone call. Maybe Al wasn’t involved.

  Late in the afternoon, Holly stood in the kitchen, staring at the wall phone as if waiting for it to ring. Tommy sat at the table nibbling at the edges of his third chocolate chip cookie that day, and he had chocolate on his hands and at the corners of his lips. He looked so adorable. So vulnerable…

  Damn! She almost wished Al had been the cop gone bad so she could get this over with. Somehow, she had to protect Tommy.

  With or without Gabe’s help.

  HOLLY ROSE from one of the seats in the greenroom, the theater’s traditional lounge for cast members when not on stage. It was furnished with shabby but chic hand-me-downs from present and former troupe members, and colorful posters hung on the walls from shows they’d previously performed.

  “I’ll take these out to my van,” she said to two youthful actors, a couple of the street sweepers. One needed a seam taken in. Another was a last-minute replacement and his costume needed to be resized. Holly had also gotten direction earlier from Evangeline: they needed two more firemen’s costumes.

  It was getting late. She’d kept a close eye on Edie and Tommy but had lost track of them over the last few minutes while fitting costumes. No matter. Edie would take good care of Tommy. But Holly would have to find them, for it was nearly time to take Tommy home and get him ready for bed.

  She would also have to call Gabe. She’d spoken to him earlier on her cell phone. He’d planned to meet her here and accompany Tommy and her home but she hadn’t seen him yet.

  Detective Jimmy Hernandez was in the audience watching the rehearsal. Holly realized Gabe must have assigned the detective to watch over Tommy and her. Gabe was determined to protect her, even from a distance. She appreciated that. But it didn’t change the fact that he wasn’t there, and he hadn’t come on time.

  Now, Holly gathered up the two street sweepers’ orange costumes and went out the back door into the parking lot behind the theater.

  The lot was dimly lit and whispered of eeriness, for the haze of the marine layer had rolled in from the ocean. The sodium lights formed a swirl of percolating illumination above her in the mist.

  Because Tommy, Edie and she had arrived late, her van was at the far side of the parking lot. She was alone out here, and her footsteps echoed back at her in the creepily silent fog.

  She swallowed, feeling her pulse rise. You’re being ridiculous, she told herself. There were dozens of people, including Jimmy Hernandez, right inside the theater. And there was no one else out here. She had no reason to feel so nervous….

  She could always get Jimmy to accompany her, but she’d only be a minute. And she wanted him to keep watch over Tommy.

  She hurried toward her van, using the buttons on her key ring to unlock the door and open the cargo door remotely.

  Mist tangoed about her vehicle, whose red color seemed strangely muted in the pulsing light. She walked briskly along the passenger side, ready to heave the costumes she was holding onto the seat—

  And tripped over something.

  She looked down.

  And screamed.

  GABE HAD JUST reached the greenroom when he heard a scream. His hand on the gun at his chest, he raced out the door and into the foggy parking lot, followed by Jimmy.

  Jimmy had last seen Holly heading for the greenroom. He’d ducked out to look after Tommy, with Edie.

  Holly wasn’t in the greenroom now. Had she screamed?

  Gabe stood in the dim, cloudy light. He glared around the small sea of parked cars to orient himself. “You see her?” he demanded of Jimmy, beside him.

  And then he saw Holly. Her yellow windbreaker flapped in the breeze as she ran toward them from the van.

  “It’s Al,” she sobbed as she reached Gabe. He grabbed her upper arms. Thrusting her gently against the nearest car, he covered her body with his own for protection. He didn’t know what the problem was.

  He only knew he had to keep her safe.

  “What about Al?” he growled. Had the son of a bitch attacked her? He looked over Holly’s head and the automobile behind it, toward the direction from which she’d come.

  “Al’s lying on the ground. I bent down to see if I could help… Gabe, he’s covered in blood. Like—”

  She didn’t finish, but as he glanced into her horrified face he knew the rest of the sentence: like Thomas.

  “I think he’s dead,” she cried.

  “Jimmy, check it out,” Gabe said. The detective ran in the direction Holly designated. “Holly, come in here.” Holding her tightly against him, shielding her from whatever might be hidden in the haze, he brought her back inside. Only then, as he looked at her in the light, did he see the blood on her hands.

  He reached into his pocket, brought out his cell phone, called for backup. “Stay here,” he said. “Right here.” People had gathered in the greenroom. She would be safe in the crowd.

  “I need to find Tommy,” she protested.

  Almost immediately, Gabe heard the bleep of a nearby siren. Jimmy must already have called for assistance. “Don’t move,” he told Holly, then went into the parking lot just as a marked cruiser rolled in.

  Quickly, he directed the officers toward Jimmy, who was at Holly’s van. And then he went back inside.

  Of course he didn’t find her where he had left her. It would be too much to ask to imagine she had obeyed this command for her own safety.

  Grumbling under his breath, he hustled from the room and into the hallway, where cast and crew were dispersing for the night. He saw Sheldon Sperling. “Have you seen Holly?”

  “I think she went down into the auditorium to look for Edie and Tommy. She said their names as she passed. She went fast and she was wringing her hands…. Is something wrong
?”

  Gabe didn’t answer. He had been at the theater before, helping Evangeline move furniture onstage, so he knew how to get into the audience area. When he reached the base of the stage, Holly stood there talking to Edie.

  “But I didn’t tell her to take Tommy,” Holly said to Edie. Her hands were clasped behind her. She was obviously trying to hide the blood on them.

  “She said you did.” Edie’s tone was defensive. Her posture was defensive, too—her shoulders were rounded instead of thrust back to emphasize her bustline, the way Gabe usually saw her.

  Gabe gathered the gist of the conversation. She had taken Tommy. She who? But Gabe had a sinking feeling he knew.

  “Where is Tommy?” he demanded.

  Holly turned to him. Confusion and fear marred the smoothness of her creamy complexion. “Edie said Evangeline came over to her a few minutes ago. She said I told her she was supposed to take Tommy home. But I didn’t, Gabe. Why would Evangeline have said so?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. But he was afraid he did.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Leaving Jimmy to direct the investigation into Al Sharp’s murder, Gabe drove his Mustang to Holly’s house. She sat beside him in the passenger seat. She had washed her hands at the theater after providing a brief statement about finding Al Sharp’s body. It was clearly the cop’s blood she had gotten on her. And Al was dead.

  Gabe wasn’t naive enough to believe Evangeline actually had taken Tommy home, but they had to try. Next stop would be Evangeline’s condo. And after that? There were plenty of places to look. Too many places for a respectable-looking woman with a little boy to simply disappear…. Assuming she didn’t harm the child.

  Surely he knew Evangeline well enough to be certain she wouldn’t do that.

  But he’d also been certain she’d never taken part in an extortion scheme. Or murder. He would give her the benefit of the doubt before calling in backup. For now.

  “The lights aren’t on,” Holly said as Gabe pulled into her driveway. “Tommy knows where I hide an extra set of keys, under a rock in the garden, so they could have gotten in.”

  Gabe swallowed the reprimand that flew automatically to his lips. She didn’t need a lecture on security right now.

  “Do you know what her car looks like?” Holly continued.

  “A navy-blue luxury sedan.” Gabe squinted in the streetlights but didn’t see it. The marine layer wasn’t as thick here, a little farther inland, but Holly’s street still hung beneath a layer of light fog. “Stay here. Let me go check the house before we try someplace else.”

  But of course Holly didn’t listen to this any more than anything else he said. She walked beside him on the yucca-shrouded path to her front door.

  “Let’s go in,” he told her, “in case she left a message on your answering machine.”

  The machine in Holly’s bedroom upstairs glowed with the numeral “1” indicating she had one message. Her expression reflected hope as she pushed the button to retrieve it.

  It was probably from a salesperson. But Gabe didn’t want to be the one to disappoint her.

  To his surprise, Evangeline’s voice blared into the room. It sounded strained, upset. “Holly, it’s Evangeline. I can’t tell you what happened tonight, but I heard something and I couldn’t… Look, I can’t talk now. Gabe will know what this is about. Don’t let anyone else but him know, and erase this message. I’m going to Sheldon’s shop with Tommy. We’ll meet you there, unless— If we’re not there, I’ll call you later.”

  To Gabe, Evangeline sounded distraught, as she would if she’d heard Tommy was in danger and she needed to get him to safety.

  But Evangeline was an actress. She’d even been at the theater practicing her performance that night. And why wouldn’t she just have contacted him if she’d heard something?

  “We’ve got to go to Sheldon’s,” Holly said. “Let’s hurry. On the way, you can tell me what she was talking about.”

  “Holly, you’re not going there. I’ll take you to the station, and…” And what? Other than Jimmy, he wasn’t certain which of his own officers could be trusted. At least he had an idea which could not be trusted.

  “Like hell you will,” Holly protested.

  Gabe looked at her. She hardly ever swore. Maybe that was because, when they were together, Tommy was generally there, too. In any event, he could tell she meant it.

  Which was just as well, because damned if he knew how else to assure her safety except to keep her by his side.

  “IT’S MY FAULT,” Holly whispered, glad Gabe was steering his car into a turn. That way, he couldn’t look at her—not then.

  He did an instant later though, just a glance before he resumed watching the road. “What do you mean?” His tone was offhand, but she could tell, even in the dim light from the red lights on the instrument panel, that he was white-knuckled from gripping the steering wheel more tightly.

  He hadn’t told her much, only that someone had been threatening Evangeline, possibly the same person who’d threatened Tommy and her. Evangeline had informed him that whoever it was had sworn something bad was going to happen soon.

  And Holly had precipitated it.

  “I… Gabe, I didn’t listen to you. Not exactly.” She told him of her conversation with Al. “If he was the cop who knew what was going on, I figured he could help. I thought—”

  “You thought what?” All pretense of civility had left Gabe’s tone. “Didn’t I tell you not— Never mind. Why, exactly, did you do that?”

  “I was trying through process of elimination to figure out which of the cops who were Thomas’s friends had gone bad. I figured if I heard from the caller after talking to Al, that Al was the one, though I hated to think so. Maybe he did know something. And that’s why he’s dead.”

  “Yeah, he knew something,” Gabe snapped. “That was one of the things I couldn’t tell you, to protect him and the case.”

  Holly felt the blood drain from her face. “The case? And Al? You didn’t do much of a job protecting him. And if you knew for sure he was involved, how could you let him around my house?”

  “Because you weren’t alone there. I sent Jimmy.”

  “But the creep who called threatened Tommy, and he—”

  “What if it’s a her?” Gabe interrupted.

  “Who? The creep?” Holly asked in confusion. They had reached the parking lot behind Pacific Way. She reached for the door handle, but Gabe leaned over her, stopping her.

  He held onto her for a moment without moving. She felt the strength of his upper body pressing against her, smelled his male scent and his breath close to her face. For a moment, she wondered inanely if he planned to kiss her. But then his head dropped to his chest and he shook it slowly. Then he sat back, pulling away from her.

  “Holly, I didn’t want to tell you any more than I had to, to protect not only you but… Never mind. You need to know. I can’t go into detail, but it’s possible that Evangeline either killed Thomas and now Al, or knows who did.”

  “What!” Holly rose in her seat, grabbing again frantically for the door handle.

  Gabe gripped her other arm, stopping her. “Wait. You need to know the rest, too. Or some of it. There was something going on. I still don’t know the details, but it involves the police. Some of my officers were apparently involved in an extortion scheme, and I’m not certain which ones, except that Al was the one who told me about it.”

  “Oh, my lord,” Holly whispered, feeling as if someone had reached into her and yanked out her stomach. “Thomas. Was he involved in the scheme? Is that why he was killed?”

  He hesitated. “I don’t know, but I think so.”

  She turned toward him in the dim light. His strong features were shrouded in shadow, but she suspected she saw the anguish of the damned there. Anguish because a fellow cop, maybe many fellow cops, had gone bad. And maybe the mayor, his aunt, too.

  Holly felt anguish, too. No matter what ill will had developed between T
homas and her, she’d considered him a good father, a good role model for Tommy, even though she didn’t want her son to follow in his father’s footsteps. But cops were supposed to be strong and brave and self-confident. And they were supposed to have integrity.

  She’d been grieving over Thomas, damn it! And now, what was she supposed to do?

  Find her son, of course. Keep him safe, no matter where the danger came from.

  “We can’t do anything about that now,” she said to Gabe, not looking at him. “But we need to find Tommy. Al knew I hadn’t found whatever they were looking for, but maybe Evangeline is holding Tommy hostage anyway, to encourage me to find it. I’m going to Sheldon’s shop right now. Are you?”

  “Yeah,” he growled. “Let’s go.”

  BECAUSE IT WAS a weeknight, and because it was nearing midnight, Pacific Way was almost deserted. Holly held Gabe’s hand as they slipped down a street that led to the storefront pedestrian mall. His left hand.

  He held his gun in his right hand. He didn’t advertise that fact, but she knew it by the way his arm hung stiff at his side, one controlled weapon gripping another.

  He no longer wore his suit jacket, just his short-sleeved blue shirt over dress trousers. He looked all business.

  Pacific Way was well-lighted, the better to attract crowds of tourists at night. But there were only a few stragglers tonight, mostly right outside the restaurants.

  Sheldon’s shop sat on a block with few eateries, none open this late.

  Holly tried hard to control the speed and volume of her sporadic breathing. The more she called attention to herself and her fear, the more likely Gabe was to try to plant her someplace safely out of the way.

  Someplace she wouldn’t be able to help Tommy.

  They reached the shop next to Sheldon’s. Gabe tightened his grip on her hand and held her back. “Wait here.” His voice was no more than a slight deviation of the murmur of the sea breeze.