* * *
Jamie didn’t cry. There was too much to be done. After hurriedly throwing water on her face, she stuck her hair in a ponytail and pulled on jeans and a shirt. She grabbed for her phone with such a shaky hand that she nearly dropped it before getting a grip.
Brad had already put up the convertible top. He gave her a hug before she climbed in. “Are you sure I can’t come with you?”
She nodded. “I’m okay.”
As she headed out, though, she wondered. Jess might survive, but dead was final. Just as she hadn’t been able to grasp her phone, she couldn’t grasp that Roy was gone. Part of her wanted to go to the scene first. Until she saw her father’s car, she wouldn’t believe this was real. He drove a BMW. People didn’t die in BMWs.
But Paul Logan had seen the car, and his pain was clear.
Hands tight on the wheel, Jamie drove over roads that were slick and littered with branches and leaves. At least the sporadic house light said there was power on Caroline’s side of town.
Only as she turned onto her mother’s street did she remember their rift. Rift or not, though, Caroline would be there for Theo. That was who she was.
The front walk was as littered as the street, the front steps soggy. Even the porch showed wear and tear from gusting winds. Ignoring the wrought-iron chair overturned near the table, Jamie reached for the doorbell and was about to press it, then pulled out her phone instead and dialed. Caroline slept with her phone on the nightstand—in case you need me, she always said.
I need you, Mom, she thought. I need you now.
She heard the phone ring inside once, twice, and pictured Caroline groping for it and squinting at the caller ID as it rang a third time. Just shy of voice mail, there was a groggy “Not now, Jamie. It can wait till morning.”
“Dad’s dead,” Jamie said in a breathy rush. “I’m downstairs at your door. Someone has to tell Theo.”
There was a long pause. Jamie was wondering whether she should ring the doorbell after all when she heard a hurried footfall descending inside.
The porch light came on and Caroline opened the door. “What?” she asked in quiet alarm as she pushed the screen open.
“Paul Logan just came to my house,” Jamie said and rushed out the details she knew.
Her mother looked stunned. After a frozen moment, she gave a tiny headshake and wrapped her arms around Jamie. “I am so sorry,” she whispered, “so sorry.” Her hold was strong and precious. It wasn’t long enough to stop the trembling deep inside, but Jamie was grateful nonetheless.
Too soon, Caroline drew back. Eyes clouded in disbelief, she asked questions, like where Roy and Jess had been and whether air bags had deployed, but they were filler, simply buying time for news that was unreal to sink in. Finally, plowing both hands—the right with its Velcro wrap—into her tousled hair, she held her elbows up and cupped her head. “Theo will be devastated. I’ll go there.”
“That would be huge,” Jamie breathed. “Brad went to the scene. I have to call Jess’s mother. She lives near Leominster and can be here in an hour, assuming she wants to come.” Jess had no siblings, just a mother and stepfather with their own children, their own interests, their own lives. There were issues, Jamie knew, not the least being resentment of Roy and the easy life he offered Jess.
“Of course she’ll come.”
“They weren’t on good terms.” Nor were Jamie and Caroline, yet here they were. She raised tearful, fear-filled eyes. “What do I tell Tad’s sitter? She’s probably, like, fifteen. She’ll freak out.”
Seeming bewildered for a minute herself, Caroline finally inhaled. “Just say that Roy and Jess are detained—uh, that they’re having car problems and that you’re filling in.”
“Dad usually drives her home.”
“One of her parents will have to come. You should call them yourself.”
Definitely. She could do that. Trust Caroline to know what to do. She was always level-headed. “Mom, about before—”
Gentle fingers touched her mouth. “Shhhh. We’ll talk later. Right now, you need to deal with Tad.”
“But how? What do I do? What do I say?”
“He’ll be asleep a while longer, so you have time. If Jess wakes up, she can tell you what she wants you to say.”
“What if she doesn’t wake up?” Jamie asked. “What if she’s in a coma for days … or … or in a permanent vegetative state?”
“Don’t go there yet.”
But how could Jamie not? I named you my son’s godmother. They were the most innocent of the angry, vindictive words she and Roy had exchanged—their last words to each other on this earth—less than twelve hours before he died. Now they took on even deeper meaning. Two years ago, shortly after Tad’s birth, Roy and Jess had asked, and Jamie had agreed, that she also be the boy’s guardian should anything happen to them.
She hadn’t thought twice about it. Nothing would happen to Roy and Jess.
Now something had.
Most people lost parents. It was the generational order of things. But so soon? So suddenly? She couldn’t begin to grasp that Roy was gone. For Tad’s sake alone, she could only pray Jess would survive.
nine
Theo MacAfee lived in a Tudor-style home at the east end of town. It had been one of the company’s first showcase properties in Williston, and Theo’s wife loved it too much to sell. Caroline had always thought it dark, though as she approached it this night, the darkness was internal. Roy was gone. Crushed. Silenced forever.
It was surreal. Oh, she knew he was human, knew it better than anyone, perhaps. But he had always been so cocksure of himself. Sudden death did not seem possible.
Other than a residual dripping from trees, the rain had stopped by the time she pulled under the portico and climbed up the broad stone steps. Her heart was heavy as she rang the bell. She waited, wishing she were anywhere else but knowing she had to be here. She was more vigilant when she pressed the button a second time, listening for the bell, hearing it, knowing it worked. Patience, Caroline. Theo had day help, but nights he was alone. He would be startled from sleep and slow to descend.
But descend he finally did, put on a light, and opened the door with a groggy caution. His eyes widened a fraction when he saw Caroline. Seeming to know that only something desperately wrong would bring her to his door in the middle of the night, he stood aside.
She slipped in, closed the door, spoke quickly and softly. For a split second, she saw panic in those blue eyes. He looked at the floor and swallowed once. Then, either because he was overwhelmed with too many emotions or simply unwilling to think, his face went blank. Caroline was midsentence, saying that Jamie was going to be with Tad, when he turned, went to the phone on the hall table, and punched in a number with a large-knuckled hand.
“MacAfee here,” he barked. “Get me the chief.” The police dispatcher must have been waiting for his call, because he was immediately patched through. Frozen in place with his shoulders bent, he said a gruff word here or there but mostly listened. The conversation was brief. When he hung up, he murmured, “Paul’s coming.” Holding up a shaky stay finger to Caroline, he went back upstairs to dress.
She would have waited even without the command. She couldn’t leave him alone at a time like this. Sinking into a Louis XIV chair that was nestled into the newel curve, she looked around at old-world furnishings, original art, creative ceramics that Patricia MacAfee had collected. What she kept seeing, though, was the look on Theo’s face in the instant she’d told him the news. Panic was one word for it, but it also held shreds of horror and loss. It was here and gone in a second, but she knew that look. Her father had worn a similar one at the beginning of the end—knowing what was happening, not knowing how to deal. The look was wrong in both men, the kind of expression that a person who had led a full and commanding life should never wear.
Feeling lost herself, Caroline thought about calling Dean. But without more information?
She shifted in the c
hair. With nothing to do but think, she had a growing sense of the enormity of what had occurred. Theo had lost his son, Jamie and Tad their father, Jess her husband. The town had lost a leader. MacAfee Homes had lost its heir.
At the sound of a motor, she jumped up. She reached the door just as a cruiser pulled in behind her truck. Paul approached wearing a devastated look.
“How’s Jessica?” Caroline asked.
“On life support. They’re not optimistic.”
She pressed a hand to her mouth. Life support was more definitive than unconscious, not good at all. Jamie would need to know. Now that Paul was here, Caroline could drive to Roy’s to help her there.
Just then, though, Theo came down the stairs. Seeming older and more frail, he was gripping the banister, taking one step at a time. He cleared his throat as he met Paul’s eyes.
“I’ll leave you,” Caroline said gently, but the words were barely out when Theo grasped her arm.
“No.” He shot her a look that reprised a world of fear, then said a lower “Stay. I’ll ride with you.”
Could she deny him? He had been her father-in-law once, and in the years since, he had been in her corner more times than she could count. He was such a solitary figure now—such a tragic figure—that, much as she wanted to be with Jamie, she couldn’t leave Theo just yet.
* * *
Jamie had stopped trying to differentiate windshield spatter from tears. More than once, when she could barely see, she thought about pulling over. But she needed to be at Roy’s. She had to let the babysitter leave and then call Jess’s mother. She wasn’t looking forward to that, but it was probably an easier task than the one Caroline faced.
Tougher, for Jamie, would be seeing Tad.
Her headlights cut a bleeding swath through wooded streets. As many times as she had visited here, she had never done it at this hour or with this burden. Her throat was an aching knot by the time she reached the house.
It was one of the newer French manor homes built by Roy on a triple-size lot. It was bigger than anything he and Jess would ever need, and far too pretentious for Jamie’s liking. Separated from neighbors and surrounded by woods, its lights were a beacon in the dark.
As fate had it, the babysitter’s mother was already there. Apparently, Jess had promised that they would be home by midnight, and when that had been missed by an hour with neither texts nor phone calls answered, the girl was worried enough to call home.
Holding it together by a thread, Jamie explained that there had been a problem and that she was filling in. It wasn’t a lie. They would know the truth soon enough. Williston had a handful of citizens who monitored the police frequency for sport. For all she knew, word had already begun to spread.
Apologizing profusely, she overpaid the girl, saw them out, and headed for Tad’s room. Despite the many times Roy had talked of buying a toddler bed, it hadn’t appeared yet. Tad was in his crib, sound asleep on his side with an arm around his favorite stuffed dog, the new moose fallen over behind him, and a zoo of other animals scattered about. She barely breathed as she listened for his soft, steady sounds. The child was blissfully unaware of the unfolding tragedy.
Child? Try “baby,” Jamie thought. He was a baby who would now never know his father. How could that be?
Overwhelmed with anger and unable to help herself, she started to cry. She quickly left the room so that she wouldn’t wake Tad, and ran down to the kitchen.
Struggling to stem her tears, just needing to get this done, she searched for Jess’s mother’s number. Naturally, it would be on Jess’s iPhone, but that would be in the car, a brutal mental image there. Plan B had her opening Jess’s laptop to pull up Contacts. But … password? Jamie had no idea. Plan C—and there it was, Maureen Olson, at the very bottom of the list of emergency numbers in the kitchen drawer. Jamie suspected it was wishful thinking on Jess’s part that the woman would actually be there for her in a pinch.
Nonetheless, Jamie felt deep sympathy waking Maureen in the middle of the night with news like this. The woman was stunned. When she couldn’t get a word out, her husband came on to ask specifics of the accident.
Jamie wished she knew more. She wished she didn’t have to now call her aunt. She wished her father, whose last words to her—and hers to him—had been ones of anger, would drive up any minute and walk through the door. She wished her mother were here.
In lieu of that, she texted Brad. Where are you?
At the scene. You don’t want to come.
Bad?
Yes. Happened earlier than we thought. Took a long time to find and extricate.
She pictured a large clawed machine being brought in to lift the tree that had fallen and remove the roof of the car. And the scene beneath?
Squeezing her eyes shut, she was trying to blot out the image when Brad texted again. Your mother just got here with Theo.
How is he?
Stoic. Did you call Jess’s mother?
Yes. She’s going to the hospital. Any news from there?
Life support.
Jamie let the phone fall to her side. Jess gone, too? No. No. If miracles happened, she could still wake up. But whole and functioning?
* * *
By the time dawn arrived, Jamie had wandered through the first floor of the house over and over again, library to living room to dining room to great room, hating the place more with each round. She felt like she was in a mausoleum. Aside from a small den filled with sturdy leather and toys, the decor was an ultratraditional mix of velvet and silk, with elaborate mahogany millwork and brocades of blue and gold. The walls were jam-packed with paintings, the tables with bowls, vases, and lamps. Had these things been family heirlooms, the effect might have been different, but the family heirlooms were at Theo’s. Roy had simply bought what the designer advised, that designer being Roy’s favorite, a longtime MacAfee employee whose style was too busy for Jamie’s. She felt suffocated here; with so much stuff packed in, she couldn’t breathe. And it wasn’t just the current horror that made it so. She had never been able to handle staying here for more than a day or two; when she was watching Tad for longer, she brought him to her condo.
This house was a showpiece, no doubt about that, but the thought of raising a child here gave her the chills. Not that Tad had free run of the place. His things were consolidated in kitchen, bedroom, and den. He could also play in a finished basement, a paved driveway, and a huge backyard. He wasn’t deprived by a long shot.
Not materially at least. But to lose parents who would be only the merest threads of memory? Stuff was worth squat compared to that.
The circles she walked didn’t include the upstairs. She couldn’t bear to see the room that Roy had shared with Jess. Rather, her base was the kitchen counter, where her cell phone lay beside the baby monitor, both of which lay beside the Keurig, which she had repeatedly used more for warmth than caffeine. She was chilled to the bone, perhaps because Roy kept the AC low, perhaps because she was in a state of shock. She hadn’t slept, doubted she could have even if she tried. Her thoughts were a muddle of disbelief and fear, her mind a demon of gruesome images, and her insides wouldn’t stop shaking.
Brad and Caroline were with Theo, and while she wished one or the other were with her, she understood Theo’s need. She exchanged texts with them, but there was little of comfort to be had there. Nor did repeated calls to the hospital help. None offered good news.
* * *
When she heard Tad crying at six, she panicked. Praying he might fall back to sleep, she didn’t move. Barely a minute passed before he called again, this time with more force. “Mommmeee.”
Swallowing a cry of anguish, Jamie headed for the stairs. She knew the early morning drill—change diaper, warm sippy cup of milk, fix breakfast. She had stayed with Tad enough to know that when she opened his door he would be standing against the bars of his crib—and there he was. His milk-chocolate hair stuck up in random curls; his brown eyes were clear, his cheeks pink. His thumb was in h
is mouth but popped out when he saw her. In his innocence, he wasn’t confused at all but cried her name in delight.
It was so sweet, so sad, that she thought she would die. He had no idea how his life had changed. It was all she could do not to bawl.
“Hi, monkey,” she whispered so that he wouldn’t hear the shake in her voice. He held out his arms as she neared the crib. Gathering him close, she left his arms around her neck while she unzipped his sleep sack. Then she scooped him into a tight hug, rocking him from side to side as she struggled not to cry.
Focus, Jamie. That’s a big fat diaper against your arm.
Regaining a bit of control, she eased off the hug. “Did you have a good sleep?”
“I wan Moose,” he said and reached back toward the crib. She put the pet in his arms and tried to lay him on the dressing table, but he squirmed until she set him on his feet on the floor. This was a change since she had stayed with him last. But okay. Doable.
That said, changing his diaper while he was standing up was a challenge. If he wasn’t dancing off toward his Playskool garage, he was reaching for a dump truck or twisting to pick up the driver when it fell out of the cab. Thinking that he definitely needed to be potty trained—would Jess be here to do it?—Jamie struggled with the clean diaper. She had never been as adept at this as Jess, simply hadn’t done it as much, and Tad wasn’t helping her out. It took three tries before the tapes were tight enough, and then she pulled on a pair of jeans to hold the diaper in place.
Sitting on the floor, he played with the truck and a bulldozer, gathering other drivers, handing one to Jamie and telling her what to do. He was actually quite clear with his instructions. “Put man dere … No, dis one … Brrrrm, brrrrrrm … Dump, Mamie.” Having her here was a game.
She was thinking how grateful she was that he didn’t know better when without warning he ran out the door toward the stairs. Heart pounding, she caught him just as he might have tumbled, though once she was beside him, she saw that he was already holding the banister. He climbed down facing front, knew to take one step at a time and move his hands accordingly. Physical coordination had never been a problem for him.
Blueprints Page 11
