by Rachel Brady
“You don’t listen very well.”
I heard my heart beating in my ears. It was deafening.
I grabbed my keys and my cell phone and bee-lined to daycare. Who did I call first? Jack? Daycare? The police? Shit. I don’t even remember.
She is safe here now, sleeping in her bed. How can I ever leave her again?
***
I hadn’t opened that journal for years. Couldn’t bear to. And now my hands shook the same way they did the day I clutched Annette’s dress in my office.
I rolled onto my side and pulled a pillow into my chest. Another episode of the If Onlys was coming on. If only I’d believed the threats. If only we’d stayed home that weekend. If only I’d been with them.
I closed my eyes and remembered Annette’s small face, her chestnut eyes, and the feel of her wispy, straw-colored hair sliding through my fingers. The way her smile matched Jack’s, the way both of them could grin their way back into my good graces. Their dimples matched. Thinking back, it was their dimples that got me every time.
I fell asleep then, and dreamed of my family, of my reunion with them. This time it was in a supermarket. They were walking through the produce section as if nothing ever happened. No time had passed; Annette was as petite as ever. She asked Jack if she could have some blueberries. It wasn’t odd that she could talk. What confused me was their casual mannerisms, their easy-going banter, their peace. I was astonished to find them alive and asked what had happened? Where had they been? Why hadn’t they told me? They looked at each other and shrugged as if the answers were things they’d simply forgotten to tell me, and then they both turned their attention to the leafy greens, casual as you please. Like they’d honestly meant to tell me they weren’t dead, but they hadn’t gotten around to it yet, and did I feel like having a salad with dinner? Then the things that happened afterward flashed through my mind—the pills, Dr. Raleigh, my loneliness in our empty house—and I realized that if Jack and Annette were still alive, then I must have dreamed those other things too. So, everything was okay. It was all a bad dream.
Chapter Eleven
Thursday the weather relented but landing fields were damp. Humidity closed tight around me like wet clothes, and the whole place smelled like earthworms. There would be soggy landings, but nobody cared.
The place was absolutely packed. Skydivers from greater Houston and western Louisiana had swarmed the drop zone, getting ready for the big weekend. Finally, I’d get a chance to meet Rick’s client base. I’d brought the disposable camera. At the end of the day, there’d be pictures to show Karen Lyons.
“Why work hard on the ground for something that’s free in the air?” Scud’s lines were flung over his shoulder as he sorted the cells of his Batwing. He’d sneaked another kiss pass, this time with Linda.
“Consider yourself lucky,” Marie told Linda, with a little pout. “When you’ve been married twenty years, any kiss’ll do.”
We were in the hangar, packing after our second jump. Scud laid down his gear and wrapped Marie in a conciliatory hug; he even managed to cop a feel on her ass.
“I’m so hungry!” I said. I caught myself separating my canopy cells a bit violently.
Scud looked up. “Easy, baby. Plenty of Scud to go around.”
Marie laughed.
Craig Clement passed us without comment and went out the back door toward the landing field. He took a quick look around and peeled to the left, toward an overflow parking area beyond the side of the building. I said I was going to watch the last load fly down, and followed Craig outside.
He disappeared behind the far side of the hangar. I peeked around its corner and watched him go to a mud-splattered pick-up with a beautiful Yellow Lab tied up in back. The day before, when I’d come in the rain, there’d been no trucks in the lot, so I doubted it was his.
He pulled a small pouch from his pocket and unfolded it. It was a napkin. For a moment, he stood by the dog and let it eat whatever was inside. I felt stupid tailing a guy feeding a dog. But when the morsels were gone, Craig stepped toward the cab and glanced around the lot. I ducked behind the enormous aluminum wall and waited out of sight.
When I checked again, he was in the passenger seat, one leg dangling out the door, rifling through the glove box. He pulled out some papers and leafed through them, then reached in his pocket and produced a phone.
Marie’s voice came over the loud speaker. Load four was on a ten-minute call and she asked Craig to come to the office. I backtracked toward the crowd and heard the faint thud of a truck door slam behind me.
My packing spot was gone. The floor was covered wall-to-wall with gear in various stages of assembly and my rig had been moved to the sidelines. I didn’t mind being bumped; it was time for lunch anyway. I knelt by my gear bag and fished for my car keys. And, suddenly, I had the uneasy feeling I was being watched.
I turned, and Vince was standing in the open hangar door.
He still looked good in jeans and a cowboy hat, but this time it wasn’t the man that grabbed my attention. It was the Burger King sacks he was holding. He shook them subtly, like a child using treats to entice a cat. When he raised his eyebrows at me, the question was obvious. Interested?
“I’ll give you fifty bucks for whatever’s in those sacks,” I said.
He smiled.
“Ain’t for sale,” he said with his slight drawl, “But I might share.” He wandered out the front of the hangar toward the soggy grass lot.
He never looked back. Where was he taking that food?
I followed him, still in my jumpsuit, and tried to unzip it and pull my arms out while hurrying after him.
“Glad to hear it,” I shouted to his back, struggling out of a sleeve. “The sides of my stomach are stuck together.”
“Said I might share,” he called back over his shoulder, and then he disappeared behind the corner of the hangar into the overflow parking area Craig was in moments earlier.
I tried to step out of my jumpsuit while keeping pace with Vince and his fast food, but I tripped and stumbled into the side of the hangar. My shoulder whacked its giant metal panel and made a thunderous bong. Thank God he was out of view.
I freed myself from the suit and rounded the corner.
Vince was opening the tailgate to the same truck Craig had searched.
He jumped into the back and sat on the bed’s plastic liner. His guitar waited there in an open case, next to the Yellow Lab. The dog had been lounging on a mound of old towels but now feverishly eyed the same sacks that drew me.
“I can’t believe you left your Martin in the sun. And next to four dirty paws…Aren’t you afraid—”
“Cindy loves music as much as I do,” he said with a dismissive wave. “In fact, we think a girl should sing for her supper.” His lips curved into a smile and he nodded toward the guitar.
Was he serious?
Cindy gave a friendly tail thump and sniffed the Burger King bags hard.
Vince reached into a bag and tossed her a couple fries, unwrapped a Whopper, and took an ungentlemanly huge bite. I looked from him to the guitar, and finally to the dog, who focused intently on Vince’s food.
Vince ate his burger as if sitting there all alone.
“Cat got your tongue?” He finished up a bite.
He squinted at me, the shadow from his cowboy hat not quite shielding his eyes from the noon sun. Looking at him too long felt a little bit like flirting. I glanced away and planted a hand on my hip.
“Come on,” he said. “Play us a song. Have lunch with me.” He punctuated the last sentence with another enormous bite of Whopper. A mayonnaise-coated chunk of tomato fell into his lap. Cindy took care of it.
“You want me to play a song for you, and then you’ll share?”
Still chewing, he only nodded. Cindy looked back and forth between us, panting.
“How about lunch first?” I said.
He held out his carton of fries and I grabbed more than a polite ration.
&nb
sp; “There. Now please sing. Don’t be difficult.”
He smiled again. I tossed my jumpsuit onto the floor of the truck bed and climbed up. I tried to scratch Cindy behind her ears, but she’d only sniff my hands, searching for a handout.
I wiped my hands on my shorts as best I could and picked up his guitar. Perched on the side of the truck, I made an unfortunate discovery in Vince’s rear window—my reflection. I was in desperate need of a hairbrush and make-up. Beyond my pitiful image was Vince’s glove compartment. I wondered what Craig had been looking for.
“What’ll it be?”
Vince wadded his burger wrapper and shoved it into an empty sack. “Another ballad.”
He leaned back onto Cindy’s abdomen and used her as a pillow. Then he pulled his hat fully over his face, stretched his legs, and crossed them at the ankles. He reached up with one hand to scratch Cindy’s chin, nuzzled very near his own, and I noticed the second fast food sack clutched in his other hand.
I sang Patsy Cline’s “Leavin’ On Your Mind” while load four droned overhead, and when I finished, Vince didn’t speak or move. Was he rude enough to fall asleep? I played another song. He still didn’t move. I nudged him in the ribs with the toe of my sneaker.
“You dead or what?”
He handed up the bag of food without moving off the dog or adjusting his hat. “Hardly. Was hoping you’d do one more.”
I returned the guitar to its case and unfolded the sack. “Maybe if you’re nice.”
He shifted onto an elbow and pushed his hat back into position.
“Hey,” I said, “you friends with Craig, the new guy?”
“Don’t reckon we’re friends, just work together. Why?”
“I saw him out here with Cindy earlier,” I said. I decided to leave out “he was nosing through your stuff.”
Vince shrugged. “Everybody likes my dog.”
He turned his attention to the sky, where canopies circled. For the first time, I noticed lines by his eyes. Laugh lines. Jack once said laugh lines were the mark of trustworthy people.
I asked him what he did at the drop zone.
“Help in the office. Fly for Rick when he’s in a pinch.”
“A pilot?” I’d seen Vince’s name on the payroll, but it hadn’t occurred to me he was a pilot.
He nodded. “Only part-time. I’m trying to get a construction business off the ground.”
I reached for a napkin. “Takes guts. Good for you.”
He picked up the empty lunch sacks and squirted water from a sports bottle into a dish for Cindy. He snapped his guitar case shut and moved it into the cab of the truck, out of the sun. I was disappointed when he pulled his rig from the front seat. Lunch was over.
Then he said, “Wanna jump?” And it was like being asked to dance.
***
Afterward, Linda took our picture with my disposable camera. Ours was the first photograph taken on my Spy Roll.
Marie asked for Vince’s help so he left and I mingled. A few jumpers were visiting from nearby drop zones, but several were regulars I was meeting for the first time. I wormed my way into as many skydives with the locals as I could. By dinnertime, I’d managed four more jumps. I took a post-dive photo with each of my groups and no one seemed to think anything of it. One girl asked me to develop doubles and send her a copy.
I called Richard on my cell and we made plans for the film hand-off. I drove north to a Super Wal-Mart he described and dropped the camera at its one-hour photo counter, using Richard’s name and number on the deposit envelope. He’d pick up the photos and take them to Karen.
I returned to the DZ and set up camp. For the next several hours, I loafed at bonfires and nursed beers. I listened to campers schmooze and bullshit, and worked on telling the regulars apart from the visitors.
Shortly after nine, my cell phone rang.
“She recognizes one of the women,” Richard said. “She knows the face, but not the name.”
I couldn’t believe something had come of my first roll of film. Even more surprising, I realized, was that it implicated a woman.
“What now?”
“Meet me at the Wal-Mart,” he said. “You have to tell me who she is.”
Chapter Twelve
Wal-Mart. One place I did not foresee a sleuthing rendezvous, but there I was.
At ten o’clock on a Thursday night, the parking lot was as busy as noon on Saturday. A mammoth SUV hogged the center of a lane, laying claim to a spot when another was vacant three spaces behind it.
I made my way inside, where I was greeted by a middle-aged man in a blue vest and dopey octopus hat. A small McDonald’s occupied a front corner of the store, and when I walked inside, Richard was leaning against the restaurant’s wall waiting for me.
“Let’s sit.” He steered me toward a table. The photo envelope was in his hand.
“Hi, Richard. Good to see you too.”
He shot me a look of flat irritation as I slid into my side of a booth.
He removed the photos from their envelope. The picture on top of the stack included the group I’d jumped with right after my dive with Vince. Scud and Marie had jumped into the shot for fun, but I didn’t remember the names of the others. I reached for my handbag. My logbook was there, and I’d written down all the names earlier. I flipped to the entry, ready to match forgotten names with faces, when Richard surprised me.
“This one, right here,” he said, tapping the glossy print. “Karen recognizes this woman. Who is she?”
I frowned. The name wasn’t in my book, and I’d never even thought to ask it. In the background of the shot, between Scud and Marie’s heads, a woman was walking across the landing field. Richard must have read my confusion.
“What is it?” He leaned in close, hungry for information I didn’t have.
“I don’t know her name,” I said, shaking my head. “She was our pilot.”
An obese woman in a muumuu and flip-flops lumbered past us with a loaded tray, and two chunky school-agers followed several paces behind her. Richard slumped backward into the hard plastic booth. At first I thought he was reeling from disappointment. Then he bit his lower lip and started nodding.
“That actually makes sense,” he said, mostly to himself. “Here’s the thing. Eric worked for a local petrochemical plant. Sometimes the job took him away from home for extended periods.”
I kept my mouth shut and let him go on.
“Karen was a stay-at-home mom, so sometimes she and Casey traveled with him.” He did his salesman nod. I nodded back to show I was following.
“They traveled on the company jet.” He looked hard at me. “Who flies the company jet?”
How the hell should I know? I wondered. And then, mercifully, the light came on. I grabbed the photo off the table and pointed to the woman in question.
“She does?” I said. “She flies for Eric’s company?”
“Karen recognized this woman from the airstrip Eric’s company uses.”
I digested that.
“If this woman flew the Lyons family around, she’d know about Casey,” I said.
Richard pulled a pen from his shirt pocket and grabbed a napkin from the tabletop dispenser. He scribbled a note.
“Easy enough for her to get their address,” he said.
One of the kids with Muumuu Woman shuffled past us on untied sneakers to get a few paper cups full of ketchup.
I lowered my voice. “What would she want with their child? Nobody asked for ransom money.”
He clicked his pen shut and shook his head.
“Oh my God!” I whispered. “Do you think this woman had something to do with Eric’s murder?”
Richard shrugged. Questions were coming too fast for both of us.
He rubbed the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes, concentrating.
A moment later, they snapped open. “I need her name. Some background.”
“Okay,” I said. That would be easy to get from the chatty crowd at the DZ.
Richard continued, “It’s been six days. You know what they say about missing kids and the first twenty-four hours, right?”
“Their odds plummet after the first day.”
“Casey’s been gone for six days. Finding out this pilot’s name and story might not be enough.”
“What are you saying?”
He regarded me briefly. “How comfortable would you be searching through the drop zone office?”
My stomach lurched.
“Define ‘searching through.’”
The look on his face said it all. He wasn’t going to define “searching through.” I felt bile rise into my throat.
“If I were to search the office, Richard, what would I be looking for, exactly?”
“Maybe the name ‘Lyons’ on some paperwork…evidence of a baby being around the place…something fishy in the day planner. Just look for stuff,” he concluded vaguely. “Interesting stuff.”
I conjured more images of a jail cell.
“How many offices have you searched in your time, Richard?”
He shrugged. “Dozens.”
“Any tips?”
He grinned. “Don’t get caught.”
I exhaled. One question remained.
“When am I supposed to search?”
Richard gave the tabletop a two-handed smack I read as our conversation-closer.
“Tonight I guess.”
Tonight he guessed. Great.
Chapter Thirteen
That night I lay awake in my tent, waiting for the middle of the night to come, unsure when exactly that was. I had one o’clock in mind, but at that hour, some folks were still loafing by fires. So I pushed it back to two. By then, the airport was silent, except for an occasional exchange between frogs.
I rolled onto my stomach and unzipped a few inches of the window panel in my tent. No one was around.
Pop-up campers and tents were set up around the field. A platinum moon, mostly full, illuminated the acreage stretched around me. I pulled on sneakers and let myself out of the tent. Remnants of campfire smoke hung in the air.
