He touched her shoulder and said, “I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.”
“You know, with Alzheimer’s the hell is before they die. You’re through the worst of it now. So is she.”
Morgan thanked him again and got in the car.
*
Celia Morning came through her kitchen door dragging luggage with four (including Kitty Curry) tired kids behind her. The house smelled stale. The air was cold. Kitty helped her take the suitcases upstairs while Merris, who hated being out of touch with her friends, headed to the den and the computer. Celia turned up the heat and rummaged around the kitchen for something to give the boys before sending them off to bed. The milk had to be thrown out and the bread was moldy.
From behind her, Timmy said, “Can we just have cookies?”
Celia had driven straight through and her head ached, so she conceded wearily. “See what we’ve got.”
Timmy went to the bread box and pulled out an opened package of Oreos and an unopened box of generic iced oatmeal-and-raisin cookies. He carried them to the kitchen table.
“I’ll get them something to drink,” Kitty said. “Why don’t you take your coat off?”
Celia watched waves of heat rise from the radiator in the corner. It would take a while to reheat the house. Then she remembered Kitty and said, “All we have that’s any good is soda.”
“Then soda it is,” Kitty said. “You go on now.”
Celia went into the living room and called Timmy and Jack. As she hung her coat in the hall closet she wondered how much it would cost to replace the French doors in the den to make a bedroom for Kitty. Something out of the corner of her eye caught her attention. The lock on the front door was broken. Celia shivered. Ben Curry had been back for his daughter. But he wouldn’t come again. She’d gotten an e-mail Friday afternoon that the “job was done.” She’d made a trip to the bank, withdrawn the payment, then gone to the local branch of First Trust and deposited the cash payment, including the ten-thousand-dollar bonus for the quick turn-around. She’d never met the contractors, but she knew they were women and they were efficient.
Maybe someday she’d forget that she’d arranged the murder of two men. After all, she’d done it to protect the ones she loved. That might not be good enough for the legal system, but hopefully she would never have to deal with the law. The killing was all over now. She could settle back into some semblance of a normal life. She could enroll Kitty in some special program to get her caught up in school. The damage that her father and other sick men had done to her would leave a mark, but Kitty was a strong girl. With the right help, she’d be all right.
Another woman might have called the police in the beginning, but Celia knew the police were powerless unless the perpetrator had broken the law. Threats weren’t enough for police intervention. Following Merris after school wasn’t enough. They might have talked to Smallwood. They might have watched him closer. But in the end, someone had to be hurt for them to make an arrest. Her first husband had taught her that.
She’d married Billy Zubeck quite young and loved him to the exclusion of everything. But he drank and had dark moods. She tried to help him through them. She tried to arrange the world so he’d feel better. When he was drinking she knew to stay quiet no matter how much he provoked her. Yet something always set him off. Before the year’s end they separated.
She moved back home with her parents, but Billy kept coming around. She’d started night classes at City College, and she’d find him waiting for her after class. She’d called the police, and they told her they couldn’t do anything unless he broke the law. Apparently, scaring the hell out of her wasn’t illegal. Finally her father started driving her to school and picking her up after class.
Then one morning, Billy met her at work. He held a gun on her and made her get into his car. She tried to run, but he caught her by the hair and practically dragged her back. She pulled away from him again and he chased her down again. People had been watching from the building and someone had called the police, but she and Billy were gone long before the police arrived. A coworker told her later that the police said it was just a “domestic thing.”
In the end Billy took her out to a fishing cabin his brother owned and held her captive there for three days. Her father had taken care of Billy. It looked like a fishing accident, like he had too much beer. There had been no life jackets in the boat.
Now Celia had ended the lives of Jon Woods and Ben Curry to protect her own daughter and Kitty. And, as with Billy, no one must ever know. Celia’s hands shook as she examined the front door. She heard the kids behind her and turned and smiled. “You all go up to bed. You can take a bath in the morning.”
Merris protested. “Aw, we just got home. It’s still early.”
“It’s after ten. You’ll fall asleep fast. Go on now.”
The three children trudged upstairs. Celia returned to the kitchen where Kitty was stacking dishes in the sink.
“Thanks so much for your help.”
Kitty turned to her, dark circles under her eyes. “He’s been here, hasn’t he?”
“He won’t be back.”
“How do you know?”
Of course Celia couldn’t tell her how she knew. “The police are watching the place.”
“That didn’t stop him. I saw the front door.”
“Kitty, I want you to stay here,” Celia said. “I want you to make your home with us.”
“I can’t. I need to leave. He won’t bother you if I’m gone.”
“We need some sleep. Things always look better in the morning.”
Kitty shook her head. “You can’t stay at your mother’s for the rest of your life. You need to be here. Your kids need to be here.”
“And I, we all, want you here with us.”
Kitty passed Celia entering the living room. “I’m leaving tonight. I appreciate all you’ve done for me. I really do. But I don’t want him to find me. I don’t want him bothering your kids.”
“He won’t—”
“You don’t know him. You don’t know what he can be like.”
“I know more than you think.” But Celia couldn’t say more. Kitty would eventually realize that her father wouldn’t hurt her again.
Kitty came toward Celia and quickly embraced her. “Thank you for your help.”
Celia held on to her for a moment and inhaled the fresh scent of shampoo in the girl’s hair.
Then Kitty pushed her away.
Celia followed her into the kitchen and reached for her purse. She located her wallet and pulled out several bills, at least three twenties, some fives and ones. She caught Kitty’s arm and shoved the bills into her coat pocket. “You call me if you need more.”
Kitty wouldn’t look at her. She pulled away and then she was gone.
Celia trembled and staggered into the living room. Then she sat and exhaled, wilting into the cushions.
*
David Holiday waited until the end of the week before he approached Morgan again. This time he made a new pot of coffee and took a cup to her. She’d been sitting on the couch in the darkened living room, her feet propped on the coffee table, staring at the blank TV. He offered her the coffee, and, mechanically, she took it and set it on an end table.
“Might get more out of that program if you turned the TV on,” David said, balancing his own cup and saucer and lowering himself into the rocking chair.
Morgan met his eyes, then looked at the coffee cup on the table, watching steam curl from the dark liquid.
David said, “I’m flying out in the morning. As much as I’d rather wait, we need to talk about financial things.”
“Do you want to know what your share of the funeral expenses is?”
David cleared his throat. “Well, that too. What I had in mind was my share of the money left from Dad’s insurance and however much we can get for the house.”
Morgan rubbed her fingers in small circles at her temples. “There is no money.”
Da
vid leaned forward earnestly, his elbows on his knees. “Come on, sis. I know better.”
“Do you? Where were you when big decisions were made six years ago?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that the only nursing home with an opening in this town required private pay for the first two years. I tried to talk to you about it, but you didn’t return my calls. That’s forty thousand a year. Where do you think that money came from?”
“I—I…”
Morgan exhaled slowly and waited for him to collect himself.
Finally he said, “How did you come up with that money? Dad’s insurance?”
“After Dad died, he had medical bills and funeral expenses. We had about twenty-five thousand left, and evidently when Mom mentioned it to you, you told her to pay off the house. Right or wrong, that’s what she did. By the time she needed the nursing home, it was too late to get her to sign the house over to me. I went to court, which was expensive and not a lot of fun, and got a power of attorney. The nursing home needed money for her care, so I re-mortgaged the house. I tried to talk to you about it, but you didn’t have time. I guess you were worried I’d ask you for money.”
“That’s not true,” David said, appearing astonished.
Morgan raised her voice. “Well, it seemed like it was true.”
“She had Dad’s pension.”
“Three hundred a month.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I’m not in a kidding mood.”
David leaned back in the rocker and put it into motion. After a moment, he said, “We’ll sue Prairie Flower, of course.”
Morgan shook her head. “I’m taking a settlement.”
“Why? What have they offered?”
She pointed across the room to a stack of mail on top of the TV. “There’s a letter over there somewhere. They’re offering funeral and burial expenses.”
“That’s it?”
“If you’d have listened to me, you’d know this isn’t the first time she got out. I tried to tell you months ago that she made it all the way home one night—scared the hell out of me. There’s nothing wrong with Prairie Flower’s security. When Mom wanted to do something, she did it. At best this was an accident.”
“So there’s nothing?”
Morgan shrugged. “About seventy-three thousand left on a mortgage. You want your share of that?”
David picked up his coffee and tasted it, then drained the cup. His voice changed. “I guess I should be thanking you for holding down the fort here—for making the hard decisions. I can see it’s taken a toll.”
“A mother’s death isn’t supposed to feel good.”
“No. It’s not.” He stood and turned to leave the room. “Did you say an extra blanket is in the hall closet?”
Morgan yawned. “Yeah, I think so.” She’d never used her parents’ bedroom.
“You know,” David said, “seems like no matter how prepared folks are, there’s never enough. Our system is pretty hard on senior citizens.”
Morgan smiled weakly. “A cautionary tale, I suppose.”
*
In the days after David left, Morgan felt like she was sleeping all the time. Eight hours was no longer enough. Sometimes she was so tired that after a cup of coffee in the morning, she went back to bed. She quickly used up her bereavement days and started on vacation days, of which she had plenty. When she passed a mirror, she saw a woman, a stranger, with a pale face and purple circles under her eyes. She had little energy and was glad to have the neighbors’ gifts of food that required no cooking. In the week after her mother’s funeral, she ate an entire chocolate layer cake, a slice at a time, and not much else. Each day she thought she’d feel better and each day she felt the same.
Her grief for her mother was coupled strangely with her humiliation over the incident at Tallulah’s. She could no longer deny that she was a lesbian, and maybe that would be okay. But having sex with a stranger in the back of a bar, passing out, then being sent home in a cab had been disgraceful. She’d taken the cab back to Tallulah’s the next day because she couldn’t imagine asking anyone for a ride over there. When the driver turned out to be the one she met on the rainy night her mother had come home, Morgan was uncomfortable. But when he told her the worst was over, she wanted to believe him. Of course, any ending, good or bad, had its baggage.
When her depression didn’t leave, Henry suggested she see a doctor. She told him she would if it continued. It continued and she didn’t.
Another week came and went, and she felt worse. Friday morning Henry rang her doorbell. She looked through the window, then opened the door. More snow had fallen sometime during the night, and Henry’s tracks leading to her porch were the first. He stamped his feet on the doormat.
Morgan braced herself against the biting cold that rushed in.
“Jesus,” Henry said. “You look like hell.”
“Thanks.” Morgan stepped out of the way and Henry entered.
When the door was closed, he said, “When was the last time you got dressed?”
Morgan shrugged. “I don’t remember. You want some coffee?”
Without waiting for an answer, she turned toward the kitchen and he followed. Moving automatically, Morgan took the last slice of pecan pie from the fridge and split it. She pulled a second mug from the cabinet and filled it with coffee. Then, with slow and somewhat mechanical movements, she set it all on the kitchen table. They ate and sipped coffee in silence.
Finally Henry said, “You need to get someone to shovel your walk or the mail won’t be delivered.”
“I know.”
“Too much for you?”
Morgan shrugged. “I don’t care about the mail.”
“Okay. Try to look at the good side. You have your life back. You can find someone special, maybe even have kids. You’re not too old.”
“Oh, thanks.” She glared at him. “What makes you think I want a husband and kids? The part of me that takes care of people is all worn out. Hell, I can’t even take care of myself.”
Henry ignored her, saying, “Detective Redick called me. He’s concerned. You haven’t been answering the phone.”
“I’ve been screening calls.”
“That so? Tell me, whose calls are you taking?”
“No one’s.”
“You two were still working on the sniper case, right?”
Morgan nodded.
“He’s got something new.”
“Really?” To her surprise, she felt a rush.
“Here’s the thing,” Henry said. “I’m not leaving here until you’ve taken a shower, washed that bird’s nest on your head, and dressed.”
Morgan touched her hair. “You don’t have to be insulting. I’m grieving my mother’s death.”
“Seems to me, you’ve gone off the deep end.”
Morgan obediently found a fresh towel and headed for the shower.
Chapter Twenty-One
When Ruby woke the afternoon of December 21, the house was empty. She could hear voices outside and was headed toward the back door when her mother came in with her face flushed, stomping the snow from her boots. While Ruby watched, Lois unbuttoned her coat, slid it off, and hung it on its hook in the mudroom.
“Is it still snowing?” Ruby asked.
“You’re up early.” Lois turned toward her. “It’s eased up some, but it’s still coming down.”
Ruby noticed her mother’s glasses were fogging over, but she hadn’t bothered to remove them. “You two aren’t trying to shovel the drive, are you?”
“No. We’ve bought ourselves a Christmas present. Get your coat on and come out to see it.”
“Is it a Jeep?”
Lois shook her head. “We decided to not replace Sophie’s car this year. We got something else.” Lois reached for Ruby’s coat. “Go on out. Sophie’s there. She can show you.”
Ruby sat on the bench to lace her boots up. Lois said she was going to make some coffee and disappeared in
to the kitchen.
Falling snow had created a feathery, white blanket. Ruby shut the door to the mudroom and the quiet enveloped her. In the cold pull of the wind, she drew in her breath. Parked in the driveway, barely clearing the roof of the carport, was an almond- colored motor home. Snow was drifting around it.
The door opened and Sophie stuck her head out. “Come on in. Let me show you around.”
Ruby stepped up and into the vehicle.
Sophie said, “Wipe your feet.”
Shutting the door behind her, Ruby obeyed. “This is beautiful. Did you guys rent it?”
Sophie shook her head, smiling. “We bought it.”
“God. It must have cost a fortune.”
Sophie hesitated, then laughed. “It’s beyond me how two women our age, on retirement incomes, can get a thirty-year loan, but the bank was willing.”
“Are you going to use it for camping?”
“We’re driving it to Florida,” Sophie said.
“Florida? A vacation, then.”
“Let me show you around and we’ll talk.”
Sophie headed toward the back of the vehicle, where she opened a door and showed Ruby the toilet and sink. “Small, but functional.” She pulled the door shut, then opened one cabinet door after the next. “These are for storage. Hot-water heater and shower in here.” Then they stood in a bedroom that was almost all bed.
“It’s beautiful,” Ruby said, taking everything in.
They went toward the front and Sophie pointed out an electric range, a refrigerator, and a small stainless-steel sink. She motioned to an undersized booth-like table and said, “Sit down. Your mother’ll be back soon.”
Ruby sat and rubbed her hands together. The vehicle was chilly, but tolerable. She looked around the living room/kitchen combination. Toward the front were the driver’s and passenger seats. Every inch of wall space contained cabinet doors.
She remembered the trip to Florida when she was a child. December would be relatively warm down there. “Do you still have friends in Florida?”
“We do,” Sophie said. “A little while back, we got a letter from Gwen and Wilma. They suggested that we come down. They bought a small condo near the beach.”
Retirement Plan Page 23
