by Tami Hoag
“That's lawyers—”
“What about lawyers?”
Fragments of conversation came to Hannah as if from a great distance down a long tunnel. The world swayed beneath her feet.
“Excuse me, ladies. I think maybe Dr. Garrison needs to take a little break. Isn't that right, Hannah?”
She felt a strong hand close gently on her arm and willed her eyes to open. Father Tom came into focus. Her gaze locked onto the concern in his face.
“You need a little quiet time,” he said softly.
“Yes.”
The word barely made it out of her mouth when the ground seemed to dip. He caught her against his side and started across the square toward the volunteer center. Hannah did her best to move her feet. Reporters moved in on them, cameramen and photographers closing off the escape route.
“Please, folks.” Father Tom spoke sharply. “Show a little decency. Can't you see she's had enough for one day?”
Apparently unwilling to risk the wrath of God, they stepped out of the way, but Hannah could hear the click of shutters and the whir of motor drives until they reached the curb.
“How you doing?” Father Tom asked. “Can you make it across the street?”
Hannah managed a nod, though she wasn't at all sure she wouldn't just collapse. Out of self-preservation she hooked an arm around Tom McCoy's waist and leaned into him, grateful for his solid strength.
“That's right,” he murmured. “You just hang on, Hannah. I won't let you fall.”
He took her into the volunteer center, where volunteers ignored ringing telephones and blinking cursors on computer screens to stare. Hannah kept her head down, embarrassed to be seen this weak and more than a little uncomfortable being seen snuggled up to the town priest. But Father Tom ignored her feeble effort to put space between them. A determined look on his face, he guided her toward what had once been the stockroom, where chairs and tables had been set up for coffee breaks.
He eased her down onto a chair and shooed out the curious and concerned onlookers with the exception of Christopher Priest, who came bearing gifts of caffeine and sugar. The professor set a paper plate of brownies down on the table. Tom accepted the cup of coffee and pressed it into Hannah's hands.
“Drink up,” he ordered. “You look like an ice sculpture. My truck is out back. I'll go warm it up, then I'm taking you home.”
Hannah murmured her thanks, trying to smile bravely. The compassion in his eyes let her abandon the effort. Compassion, not pity. An offer of the strength of his friendship. He brushed the back of his knuckles along her cheek absently, as if he did such things every day, but Hannah felt a tingle of electricity. She sat back, beating herself up mentally for her reaction. He was Father Tom, priest, confessor, erstwhile cowboy, absentminded shepherd of the flock of St. Elysius.
“You forgot your gloves again,” she murmured.
He pulled them out of his pockets and waved them at her, then headed for the back door. Hannah turned her attention to the coffee cup warming her hands, to put her mind on something mundane. She sipped the steaming brew, surprised that it had been lightened to her preference.
“I remembered you take milk,” the professor said, a twinkle of pride in his eyes. “You sat across the table from me at the chamber of commerce dinner last year.”
“And you remembered that I take milk?” Hannah offered him a small smile.
He sat back against the edge of another table, his hands tucked into the pockets of a black down jacket that puffed out around him like an inflatable muscle suit. His head poked up above the collar on a skinny neck.
“I have a head for trivia,” he said. “I haven't had a chance to tell you how sorry I am about Josh.”
“Thank you,” she murmured, glancing away. What an odd ritual, the manners dance of condolences. It seemed so useless for people to apologize over something in which they had no part; it seemed too civilized to thank them for it. This was just another aspect of her role of victim she couldn't reconcile herself to.
She could feel the professor's gaze on her, steady, studying as he studied everything that lived and breathed and couldn't be plugged into an electrical socket—as if he understood machines far better.
“I guess I'm not handling it very well,” she confessed.
“How do you think you should handle it?”
“I don't know. Better. Differently.”
He put his head on one side in a pose reminiscent of the android Data on Star Trek: The Next Generation. One of Josh's favorite TV shows. The reminder stabbed like a needle. “It's curious,” he said, “that people have come to a point where they almost feel they should be preprogrammed for everything that happens in their lives. Spontaneous reaction is a rule of nature; people can't control their responses any more than they can control the random events that trigger them. And yet they try. You shouldn't apologize, Hannah. Just let yourself react.”
A rueful smile turned her lips as she took another sip of coffee. “Easier said than done. I feel like I've been cast in a play but I don't have a script.”
The professor pressed his lips together and hummed a note of consideration. Hannah envisioned his brain clicking and clacking like a computer as he processed the information.
“I should thank you while I have the chance,” she said, looking out through the open door into the former appliance showroom where people she didn't know were squinting at computer screens and stuffing envelopes with fliers. “We really appreciate the time and talent you and your students have given. Everyone has tried so hard to be helpful.”
A hint of a blush tinted his pale cheeks as he waved off her gratitude. “It's the least we can do.”
The back door opened and Father Tom made a dramatic entrance in a cloud of wind-driven exhaust fumes, his glasses completely fogged over. “Come along, Doctor. If we hurry, we can still ditch those reporters.”
He tossed her a long, hideous scarf that had been knitted from every unappealing and uncoordinating color in the spectrum, and a black baseball cap with the words THE GOD SQUAD printed in bold white letters on the front.
“What's this?” Hannah asked.
From his coat pocket he pulled a pair of fake glasses with a big plastic nose and mustache attached. He flipped the bows open and shoved the glasses onto her face, then smiled at the effect. “Your disguise.”
12:04 P.M. 20°
I'm not much of a cook, but I can microwave leftovers with the best of them.”
“It smells wonderful,” Hannah said dutifully but without enthusiasm as he set the stoneware plate of beef stew down on the table in front of her. It looked like a cover shot for Woman's Day—thick chunks of meat and potatoes, bright orange disks of carrot, peas as green as spring grass, all in a thick, rich gravy. Too bad she couldn't find any desire to eat it.
“Don't even think about pushing it away,” Father Tom warned, sliding into the chair across from her. “You'll eat it or I'll feed it to you. You need food, Hannah. You almost passed out.”
Reluctantly, she picked up her fork and speared a slice of carrot. Her hand was shaking as she raised it to her mouth. Tom watched her like a hawk while she chewed and swallowed. He twisted the cap off a bottle of Pete's Wicked Ale and slid it across the table to her.
“Improves the appetite,” he explained with a wink. “Spoken like a true Irishman, eh?”
Hannah laughed softly. She tried a small bite of beef and washed it down with the ale. They sat in the kitchen of the rectory, a big old Victorian house that occupied the lot behind St. Elysius. In times past, when clergy had been in more abundance, the house had served as home and hotel to a host of priests and ecclesiastics. It had served a stint as a halfway house for alcoholic priests in the fifties. Now the rambling place housed only Father Tom. He had closed off the whole second story to conserve heat.
The kitchen was sunny, with old glass-fronted cabinets and yellow wallpaper featuring teakettles. The small table was tucked into an alcove out of the flow of tr
affic—not that there was any. The house was empty except for the two of them.
“Thanks for rescuing me,” Hannah murmured, eyes downcast.
Tom buttered a chunk of homemade bread and handed it across to her. She was ashamed to need rescuing, he could see that plainly, just as she had been ashamed to cry on his shoulder. She was too brave for her own good. He ached painfully at the thought of her trying to get through this ordeal as the Hannah Garrison everyone in Deer Lake knew and loved—calm, stoic, confident, and wise enough to solve everyone's problems. The calm had been shattered, the confidence destroyed, all in a single blow. She was lost and he saw no sign of Paul helping her navigate.
What kind of man could be so blind that he could look at Hannah and not see a jewel?
“I know everyone is trying to help,” she said in a small, strained voice. “They're being so wonderful, it's just that . . . It's all so . . . wrong.”
She raised her head and looked at him, pain and confusion swimming in her blue eyes. Her hair was still rumpled from wearing his cap. Curling strands of gold fell across her forehead and trailed down a cheek. She looked like an angel who had taken a long fall from her cloud.
“It's wrong,” she whispered. “It's like we're on a train that's jumped the tracks and nobody can stop it. I want to make it stop.”
“I don't think we can, Hannah,” he confessed sadly. “We can only hang on for the ride.”
He reached out to her across the table, offered his hand silently. For good reasons, just reasons, and reasons he wouldn't give voice even in the deepest, most private part of his mind. Reasons she could never know and would probably never suspect. So where was the harm? That question would open the floodgates on a hundred more for which he would find no answers, and so he silenced it. Nothing mattered at that moment but giving Hannah some comfort, some sign that she wasn't alone.
A single tear spilled over her lashes. Slowly she slid her hand across the table and took hold of his. Their palms fit against each other perfectly. Their fingers curled automatically. At the warmth of the contact and the feelings it stirred inside, Hannah's eyes widened slightly in surprise.
“I'd change it for you if I could, Hannah,” he whispered. “If I could work a miracle, I'd do it in a heartbeat.”
Hannah thought she should thank him, but no words formed in her mouth. She couldn't seem to do anything but hold on to him and take in the quiet strength and conviction he offered. And she couldn't help but feel the sting of irony that the one man willing to share her burden and help her through this ordeal was not her husband but her priest.
She felt the intrusion seconds before Albert Fletcher cleared his throat. A sense of anger and disapproval tainted the moment like a layer of soot settling on her skin. She jerked her gaze to the basement door, cursing herself and Fletcher as she pulled her hand out of Father Tom's grasp. How long had Fletcher been standing there? He had no business spying on them or frowning at them as if he'd caught them doing something wrong. And she had no business feeling guilty . . . but she did.
“Jeez, Albert,” Tom said, pulling back the hand he had offered Hannah and pressing it against his chest. “Give us heart attacks, why don't you? What the devil were you doing in the basement?”
The deacon regarded him with a somber look. He was dressed in his usual black garb—slacks, turtleneck, old quilted jacket—a habit that might have grown out of mourning his dead wife or out of his obsession with the church. He held a good-size cardboard box in his arms, a box with water stains and the white film of mildew. Its musty smell slipped beneath the robust aroma of the stew. “I'm sorting through the storage room.”
“Back in the dungeon?” Tom shuddered in distaste. “That stuff's been back there since the Resurrection. What would you want with any of that?”
“It's history. It deserves preservation.” The deacon shot a dark glance at Hannah. “I'm sorry if I interrupted something.”
Tom pushed his chair back from the table and rose, working at containing his temper. God alone would be his judge. For all of Fletcher's pious posturings, he was not God or even a reasonable substitute.
“Dr. Garrison needed a sanctuary. The last I heard, we were in the business of offering refuge and comfort.”
Fletcher looked through him. “Of course, Father,” he murmured. “If you'll excuse me . . .”
He nodded to Hannah and slipped out the back door, leaving behind a tension that hung in the air. Hannah dodged Tom's gaze and got up from the table. She pulled her coat off the back of her chair.
“I should get home,” she said quietly. “Paul will be wondering.”
Tom sighed and pushed his glasses up. “You didn't finish your lunch.”
“I'll eat when I get home. I promise. I've got plenty to pick from; the casseroles are multiplying geometrically.” She zipped her coat, then forced herself to push past her guilt and embarrassment and raised her eyes to his. “Thanks, though. For the food . . . for the support . . . for everything.”
He started to say it was nothing, but it wasn't nothing. It was something more complicated than either of them needed and something so simple, it should have needed no explanation or apology. He shrugged his jacket on and dug his keys out of the pocket.
“Come on, Doc, I'll drive you home.”
They left her van downtown to avoid alerting the media to her plans. Hannah didn't ask him in. She didn't want to further ruin the day by having to listen to Paul snipe at him. But a heavy sense of loneliness pressed down on her as she climbed the steps and let herself in the mudroom. A BCA man sat at the kitchen table drinking Mountain Dew and reading Guns & Ammo. He gave her a nod. In the family room, the television was showing a figure skating competition to no one. The low murmur of voices drew her up the stairs and down the hall toward Lily's room.
“Paul? I'm home.”
Hannah pushed the door open and stopped. Karen Wright stood next to the crib with Lily perched on one hip. Karen was smiling at the baby, tickling her chin and cuddling her close. Paul stood beside her. Raising his eyes to meet Hannah's, he took a half step back, his face carefully blank.
Impervious to the sudden unease in the room, Lily beamed a smile and reached a hand out to Hannah. “Hi, Mama!”
“Hi, sweetie,” she responded, her gaze skating past her daughter. “Karen, I didn't expect you to come over again today. Is the neighbor brigade running low on recruits?”
Color flared across Karen's cheekbones. “Oh, well, I, a— I hadn't planned to, then Garrett told me he had to go somewhere today, so I was alone, and I just thought—”
“Jesus, Hannah,” Paul grumbled. “People are trying to be helpful. Do you have to give them the third degree?”
“I wasn't!”
He ignored her protest. “Did you save the world while you were out?”
His sarcasm stung. Down the hall behind her the phone rang. “I think I'll go change clothes.”
As she backed out into the hall, the BCA agent caught her attention. “Dr. Garrison? Please take the call in the family room.”
“Call?”
The phone chirped again and she hurried to the family room, unable to scrape together much hope. It was probably yet another reporter. Paige Price had been after her to do an in-depth interview. Heartless vampire. Didn't these people realize what it was to hurt, to be afraid? Didn't they realize their morbid curiosity only made things worse?
She snatched up the receiver. “Hannah Garrison.”
The static of a bad connection crackled over the line. Then came the voice, small and so soft she had to strain to hear it.
“Mom? I want to come home.”
CHAPTER 19
* * *
DAY 4
9:55 P.M. 13°
They traced the call to a phone booth outside the Suds Your Duds laundry sixty-five miles away in the small, quiet town of St. Peter, home of Gustavus Adolphus College and the state's maximum security institution for the mentally ill. The phone, its receiver dangling, was o
n the end of the building—a dreary little strip mall built in the sixties when blond brick and flat metal awnings were considered in good taste. Also occupying the shopping center was a small appliance repair service shop that was closed Saturday afternoons, a Vietnamese grocery where English was not even a second language, and the Fashion-aire Beauty Salon, where the wash-and-set crowd got their beehives teased and their white hair dyed blue.
None of the patrons at the grocery wanted anything to do with cops. All the customers of the beauty salon wanted in on the action. Unfortunately, none of them had seen anything. Aside from being at the opposite end of the strip mall from the Suds Your Duds, the heat from the bonnet hair dryers and the mist from the rinse sinks combined to completely fog over the front windows of the shop. In the laundry two college students and three mothers of sticky-faced, wide-eyed toddlers answered all questions asked. But there were no windows looking out on that end of the building and there was no reason to go out into the cold to use the phone because there were two inside the laundry.
No one had seen Josh. No one had seen a light-colored van. For the cops, the wave of hope crashed and washed back out on yet another tide of disappointment.
“It could be a hoax,” Mitch said. “Kids playing around. Hannah said she couldn't swear it was Josh's voice.”
He sat across from Megan at the fake woodgrain table in her room at the Super 8 Motel. The remains of a mostly uneaten Chinese takeout dinner cluttered the tabletop. The smell of congealing broccoli and beef almost masked the acrid stink of age-old cigarette smoke that permeated everything in the room. On the nightstand next to the bed, a cheap clock-radio glowed red: 9:57 P.M. Michael Bolton rasped out a song lamenting the demise of a love affair on the airwaves of the only station that would come in.
Megan flicked a chunk of almond chicken across her paper plate with her fork. “I'd say I can't believe anyone would be that cruel, but then, that would sound stupid, wouldn't it?”
