Lullaby and Goodnight

by Staub, Wendy Corsi

  My hands.

  Yes, Helen thinks, barely able to contain her joy, turning at last to look at her beloved husband, any moment now . . .

  “What made you realize your friend might be in trouble?” Jarrett is asking Gil Blaney, as Anne Marie forces down acrid coffee from a police station percolator that looks like it hasn’t been washed in a month.

  “I guess I just finally woke up,” the man says, his head bent as if in shame. “I’ve been caught up in my own problems the last few months. Maybe if I hadn’t been so self-involved, I might have realized something was wrong with Peyton’s situation.”

  “What situation do you mean?” Anne Marie asks.

  “Rita was always there. Whenever I called, whenever I tried to visit. It was like she was standing guard so that nobody could get to Peyton. I just figured she was trying to help since Peyton had to stay in bed. I thought she just wanted her to rest.”

  “You can’t blame yourself,” Jarrett tells the man, who shakes his head, looking pale.

  “If anything happens to her, I’ll never forgive myself. Thank God I saw the news this morning and recognized the name of her doctor and the friends she’d told me about. I went straight over there and let myself in when nobody answered the door, but the place was empty. So I called the police.”

  Anne Marie swallows hard over a lump in her throat, wishing somebody had been there for Heather. If only somebody had been able to find her, before it was too late. . . .

  “Mrs. Egerton?” Detective Jacobs appears in the doorway of the tiny room where Anne Marie has spent the better part of this harrowing day. “I just wanted to let you know . . . the police out on Long Island have brought the Clements couple in for questioning. We’ll have to do the DNA testing to confirm it, but I wanted you to know that Kelly Clements is most likely your granddaughter.”

  Unable to speak, Anne Marie lifts her eyes to heaven and offers a silent prayer of thanks, to God and to the woman who long ago taught her something she never forgot.

  There are things a mother just knows, if she listens to her heart.

  She’s reached her limit, the end of her rope.

  This is it.

  She can’t bear another minute, another second, of the pain.

  Her eyes squeezed shut, her body on fire, Peyton fervently wants only to die.

  Or maybe that’s what this is, this bloody torture. Maybe she’s already dying.

  Maybe Rita is killing her, or Tom is killing her. . . .

  I trusted them both.

  I was a fool.

  “No! Stop it!”

  Rita’s angry shout travels across a great distance to pierce the rushing in Peyton’s ears.

  Who is she talking to?

  Her husband . . .

  Peyton’s body jerks violently against the terrible pressure, the searing sensation in her loins.

  No, don’t give in to it.

  Think. Try to think.

  Don’t give up.

  Who . . . ?

  J.D.!

  That’s Rita’s husband, she realizes triumphantly.

  He must be here, too. She said he was here . . .

  But Peyton heard only Tom’s voice.

  Dear God, why does this hurt so damned much? Shouldn’t the pain be left behind now? Isn’t death an escape?

  Peyton groans, pants loudly, clutches, screams in agony. Nothing makes it stop. Nothing makes it all go away.

  Then her own keening wail mingles with a piercing shriek.

  Rita.

  Peyton hears a grunt, a crashing thud somewhere beyond the bed.

  She strains to hear what sounds like, “Peyton, hang on. You can do it!”

  Tom. Tom is calling to her.

  Why?

  Tom wants to hurt her. He wants to kill her.

  She should be afraid. . . .

  Fight.

  You have to fight.

  The voice comes from within, from a well of strength that once belonged to her.

  “No,” she moans. “No.”

  She can’t fight, hasn’t the stamina to fight.

  Longing now only for reprieve, for death, Peyton struggles to ignore the voice in her head, the one that’s growing more potent with every word, telling her to hang on.

  It’s her own voice, speaking up at last.

  Don’t let them do this to you.

  You have too much to live for.

  You’re a mother.

  Yes.

  Oh God, yes.

  The baby.

  That’s what it’s all about now.

  So much to live for.

  Somewhere deep within a soul that’s stirring to life again, the light comes on again. A mere glimmer of the fortitude that’s gotten Peyton Somerset every place she ever wanted to be.

  “No!” she bellows, pulling herself forward, clinging to the bedpost, clinging to her very life itself. Driven by fury, by need, she bears down with all her might as a tremendous rushing sensation sweeps through her . . .

  And then it’s over.

  The ruthless tension dissolves.

  The deafening roar is silenced, as are the voices.

  They’re gone, all of them: Rita, Tom, J.D.

  Spent, Peyton is immersed in utter darkness, attempting to grasp the enormity of what’s happened to her.

  This is death.

  Then she hears it.

  And it isn’t death.

  It’s life.

  Precious life, punctuated by the unmistakable high, thin wail of a newborn child.

  Her skull is gripped in a vise of pain that obliterates everything—sight, sound, smell . . .

  There is nothing but the pain, and the shocking knowledge that he caused it.

  J.D.

  Slugged her with his mighty fist, when all she wanted was to show him their baby . . .

  The baby!

  Helen struggles to open her eyes, and when she succeeds is met by blinding pain and light that shines far, far above her.

  I’m on the floor, she realizes in shock. He knocked me to the floor.

  It was a mistake.

  Of course.

  He didn’t realize.

  He thought I was somebody else.

  “J.D., help me. Please . . .”

  A shadow looms above her.

  “Don’t move. If you move, so help me, I’ll kill you.”

  “But . . . I love you,” she whimpers, knowing he’ll say it in return. He has to say it in return.

  But maybe he didn’t hear her, or maybe he’s gone.

  Maybe she’s simply closed her eyes.

  Her head hurts so badly . . .

  The baby!

  She hears it.

  Her baby is crying.

  Her baby needs her.

  Helen reaches out, reaches for the baby, finds nothing but emptiness.

  “Where’s my baby?”

  Arms frantically clawing the air, she tries desperately to reach her child as the wails grow louder.

  “Hush, little one, hush. Mama’s here,” she croons, and begins to hum a lullaby, never realizing that she isn’t hearing the wail of a baby at all, but the howl of approaching sirens.

  Peyton cradles her daughter against her breast as the medics wheel her out into the night air. They wanted to take the infant out separately, but she refused to let go.

  She’ll never let go.

  Tom, walking beside her, reaches out to tuck in the loose flap of her blanket. “Is there anybody you want me to call?”

  So many people will want to know she’s arrived, Peyton realizes, serenely gazing down at her daughter’s tiny face. She’s no longer wide-eyed as she was shortly after her birth, when she gazed unblinkingly into her mother’s eyes as if in curious recognition. Now her delicate eyelashes are fluttering like the wings of a butterfly, ready to carry her off to sleep, where there will be no lingering effects of the trauma mother and daughter survived.

  “You don’t have to call anyone yet,” Peyton tells Tom, as the medics roll
her down a short path beneath a canopy of old trees, toward the open back of a waiting ambulance.

  There will be plenty of time for spreading the happy news.

  Plenty of time for everything.

  “I’ll meet you at the hospital,” he promises. “Okay? As soon as I’m done here.”

  She nods, following his gaze to the cluster of police cars and uniformed officers who swarmed the house in the moments after the baby was born.

  What if they had been too late?

  If Tom hadn’t shown up when he did, there’s no telling what Rita would have done to her.

  The stranger Peyton once called her friend was hallucinating, babbling incoherently as they took her away in handcuffs, calling for a husband and sons who reportedly don’t exist.

  Peyton shudders to think that she trusted the woman who wanted to kill her, that she actually believed all Rita’s terrible, manipulative lies about the man who saved her life.

  None of what Rita told her about Tom was true . . . other than the fact that he was outside the brownstone this morning, trying to break in.

  Not to kill her . . . to save her.

  “I’ll see you at the hospital,” Tom says, leaning to kiss her head and lay a gentle, brief hand on the baby’s blanket.

  “Wait, Tom. How on earth did you find me here?” Peyton asks, holding on to his arm.

  A shadow crosses over his face. “Wanda.”

  “But—” She shakes her head, certain she didn’t dream the terrible news this morning. “Wanda is—”

  “I know. I’m so sorry.”

  So it’s true.

  The momentary glimmer of hope is replaced by somber grief again.

  “Wanda had been trying to reach you, Peyton, to warn you. But Rita kept answering the phone at your place. And Wanda got scared. She must have remembered my last name, and where I work, and she tracked down my voice mail there last night.”

  “She remembered,” Peyton says with a nod, hearing Wanda’s voice echoing in her head once again.

  “I was just making sure he’s good enough for you.”

  “I didn’t get her message until I got to the lab this morning,” Tom tells her. “She said she had just tried to call you but you weren’t home. She had a bad feeling about Rita, and wanted me to check her out if I could. She was worried about her spending so much time with you.”

  “Oh my God. Wanda . . .” Peyton’s voice breaks. “If it weren’t for her—”

  “I know. She left me Rita’s real name and her addresses. That’s how I tracked you down.”

  “Sir? We need to get her out of here now,” one of the medics interrupts, as the gurney is pushed to the open door of the ambulance.

  “I’ll see you at the hospital,” Tom promises again. “Both of you.”

  Both . . . ?

  Oh! Yes. How could she have forgotten already?

  Gazing contentedly at the child in her arms, she tells Tom with a smile, “We’ll both be waiting.”

  Month Nine

  October

  EPILOGUE

  Wheeling the navy blue buggy into Madison Square Park, Peyton admires the patchwork of vibrant foliage against the slate-colored cityscape and overcast sky. She pauses for a toddler who scampers into her path, chased by a harried nanny.

  Glancing down at the buggy’s occupant, in the midst of her usual midmorning nap, Peyton thinks, Next year at this time, Allie, you’ll be toddling off on wobbly little legs to explore the world.

  And hopefully, Peyton will be lucky enough to be the one chasing after her most of the time.

  One good thing came out of the glaring local publicity that followed her abduction and rescue: she was contacted by the publisher of a parenting magazine and invited to interview for a part-time advertising sales position. She discovered that there’s more money—and a far less hectic schedule—in the sales end of the industry. Better yet, there’s no Tara.

  The job is hers if Peyton wants it . . . and she’s decided that she does.

  Just yesterday, she called Kaplan and Kline to tell her boss she won’t be returning after her maternity leave. Candace promised she’ll have Tara return the call as soon as she gets back from Prague.

  “How’s little Allie?” the secretary asked. “When are you bringing her in to see us?”

  “Soon,” Peyton promised.

  And she will . . . any day now. Soon she’ll be ready to share with her concerned former coworkers the baby whose name, Allison Wanda, honors Peyton’s lost friends.

  For now, she’s still feeling too protective to venture far beyond familiar territory. And no wonder, given what she’s been through.

  Unlike her mother, who is still plagued by occasional nightmares, little Allie sleeps peacefully, eats regularly, and smiles often.

  But things are gradually getting easier for Peyton. The therapist Nancy recommended, whom she’s been seeing twice weekly, ensured her that the frightening memories will fade a little more every day. In time, she’ll be able to stop looking over her shoulder, stop searching for hints of masked insanity in even the most trusted faces around her.

  With luck, she’ll never again have to face the woman who tried to kill her. It’s unlikely that the woman who called herself Rita Calabrone will be found mentally fit to stand trial for more than a dozen murders that have now been linked to her. Allison Garcia’s body was found with the others when the pond behind the farmhouse was dredged.

  Heather’s mother, Anne Marie, sent Peyton flowers in the hospital, and her wealthy husband set up a private school and college scholarship trust for Allie.

  “So you won’t ever have to struggle as a single mother, the way I did, wondering how I was going to pay for my daughter’s education,” Anne Marie told Peyton in one of their many telephone conversations.

  The woman has become a friend and a source of comfort these last few weeks, as have Gil, and Nancy, and even Dr. Lombardo, who has already broken his no-house-calls rule for Peyton. In her postnatal checkup last week, he pronounced her remarkably well recovered, at least physically, from the ordeal of her daughter’s birth.

  Emotionally, it’s going to take some time.

  For all of us, Peyton thinks, recalling the tears she’s shed with Nancy, and with Wanda’s and Allison’s families.

  And with Anne Marie, tears of both sorrow and joy. Thanks to DNA evidence, she now has the chance to get to know her granddaughter. The Clements have agreed to let their daughter Kelly get to know the Egertons, and Anne Marie has agreed, in exchange, not to press charges that would disrupt the child’s life and possibly rip her from the only parents she’s ever known.

  “How can I do that to her, and even to them?” she asked Peyton. “They believed everything that lunatic told them. They thought they were rescuing an unwanted baby.”

  Mary and Javier Nueves thought the same thing. They, too, are expected to be exonerated of any charges. And when they are, Allison’s parents are considering returning their granddaughter to the couple’s custody. As her mother explained to Peyton, they already have their hands full raising their teenaged grandchildren. And the Nueves will be good parents. They love little Dawn with all their hearts.

  Just as I love you, Peyton silently tells her sleeping daughter, as a brisk October breeze rustles the branches overhead and she reaches down to tuck the blanket more securely around her.

  Maybe someday, she’ll be less vigilant, more relaxed. Maybe the time will come when her last nightly waking thought isn’t a fervent prayer for her child’s safety.

  Then again, maybe not.

  As Gil said, “You’re a parent now. It goes with the territory. You’ll never stop watching, or worrying. Your life will always be centered on this life you created.”

  That’s why he’s leaving New York in a few days, to move out to the West Coast where his ex-wife has gone with his children. Peyton is going to miss her old friend, but of course she understands.

  Just as she understands why Eric, Wanda’s married boyfri
end, was forced to choose his newborn daughter over his wife. In time, perhaps, his wife will get past his betrayal and accept little Erica into their home. But for now, Eric is living in Wanda’s apartment, taking care of the child who was unfairly left motherless by a madwoman.

  Peyton will never understand what led Helen to commit the heinous crimes that robbed countless parents of their children, countless babies of their mothers. Her ex-husband, interviewed in one of the tabloids, said simply, “Helen went crazy with grief when our babies died. She just never recovered.”

  Peyton shuddered when she read that, cradling her own child closer to a heart that manages, even now, to ache in empathy for another mother’s unbearable loss.

  But that doesn’t mean she’s been able to forgive, or forget.

  Maybe someday, according to the therapist. And maybe not.

  Either way, she’ll survive.

  She’s reached the designated bench in the center of the park, between the reflecting pool and the playground. Keeping a protective hand on the handle of the carriage, she sits and watches the children romping in the faint rays of golden light that are now beginning to poke through the clouds.

  “Mommy, Daddy, look,” a little girl shouts from high up on a ladder, to a couple on a nearby bench. “The sun is coming out. I’m climbing up to touch it!”

  Someday, Peyton thinks with a smile, I’ll be sitting here watching Allie climb up to the sun.

  And maybe, just maybe, she won’t be alone. Maybe Allie will be shouting, “Mommy, Daddy, look!”

  Footsteps scuffle through the fallen leaves.

  Peyton looks up to see the man she’s been waiting for.

  Tom kisses her cheek, gently touches the bundle in the carriage, and says, “Sorry I’m late. Should we go get breakfast ?”

  “Let’s just sit awhile,” Peyton suggests with a smile, patting the bench beside her. “I have a feeling it’s going to be a beautiful day after all.”

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