by Nicole Baart
But Lucas didn’t find many pictures of Angela, and her hands were hidden in all of them. As for pestering Alex, Lucas did learn that Jim’s death was ruled a suicide, and that the bones beneath him had belonged to a young woman in her late teens or early twenties. Another piece of the puzzle fit. But he didn’t tell Jenna that.
Because Lucas didn’t seem to have the tools to fix what was wrong at home, he worked overtime to make things right at the clinic. But as the week wore on, he found himself fatigued, distracted. The ring was heavy in his pocket, and Jenna’s distance weighed heavy on his heart. He felt anchored and useless.
On Wednesday afternoon he struggled to pay attention to a boil, a common cold, and a routine physical, in that order. But his mind was elsewhere. When he finished up the physical, Lucas made his way to the reception desk at the clinic and stared over his nurse’s shoulder, trying to gauge what the damage would be if he sneaked out for the rest of the afternoon.
“Impossible,” Mandy muttered, ascertaining Lucas’s business at the front of the clinic before he even said a word.
“You could get me out of this,” he coaxed, glancing up quickly to survey the waiting room full of ailing patients. He smiled benignly and moved his mouth closer to Mandy’s ear. “They can’t hear me, can they?”
“They’re sick, not deaf.” Mandy rolled her eyes. “But at least you’re whispering. There is a reason we put twenty feet between the reception desk and the first of the chairs.” She elbowed him out of the way and, pushing off the floor, slid across the enclave on the castor wheels of her chair. Pulling two charts from the wall of files, she handed them to Lucas. “You’ve got a broken arm follow-up in room one and a potential bladder infection in two. I’ve already run a urine sample. I’ll pop in with the results in a minute.”
“And these?” Lucas sighed, waving the charts.
“They’re your next two patients. I thought since you walked all the way up here, you could save me a trip back. Helen is on her break, so I’m pulling double duty.”
“Sure, glad I could help out.” Lucas turned to leave, but Mandy caught the end of his white coat and gave it a tug.
“Hang in there.” She winked and plastered a smile on her face to greet the next patient, who was already standing at the counter.
The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur of symptoms and sympathy, except for one appointment when both of Lucas’s hands were busy with the Doppler, trying to find a fetal heartbeat in a woman sixteen weeks along. Pressing the handheld device to the young woman’s stomach, Lucas circled slowly beneath her belly button, finding first her own heartbeat resonating through the placenta and then, incredibly, the race of the tiny heart inside her. His hand flinched imperceptibly upon finding the body that was only inches away from his touch.
“Is that it?” the woman asked breathlessly. “I’ve never heard it before—they couldn’t find the heartbeat at my last visit.”
Lucas nodded but didn’t make eye contact with her. The baby was moving and he had to concentrate on the rotation of the Doppler as he tried to follow the sound of her little heart. “One hundred and fifty-two beats per minute,” he finally managed. “Well, more or less.”
The woman was still trying to hold her breath, her eyes riveted to the ceiling and a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “That’s high, isn’t it? Am I having a baby girl?”
The sound of sharp static interrupted the steady pulse that filled the room. “The baby’s kicking,” Lucas commented, a smile beginning at the corners of his own lips. “And no, heart-rate doesn’t really mean anything at this stage. Closer to your due date there’s some truth to that old wives’ tale, but I wouldn’t put any money on it.”
For a moment, the sound was lost and Lucas had to struggle to find it again. When he did, the room was hushed except for the even whisper of blood being pumped. It was more beautiful than any music he had ever heard. It was the throb of something so real, so profound that Lucas’s heart ached for the life that held so much promise at such a young age. All the years and love and life; every smile and tear and breath contained in someone so amazingly small no one would ever know she existed unless her mother chose to share her secret. It was nothing short of miraculous.
Finally, hesitantly, Lucas pulled the Doppler away and handed the woman a towel to wipe the gel off her belly. “Everything looks good,” he said with his back to her. “You seem to be healthy, the baby seems fine.”
But even as he offered those encouraging words, he fought the almost overwhelming desire to run a set of labs. HCG levels, progesterone, maybe a thyroid scan. Had anyone ever talked to her about Factor V Leiden? Sixteen weeks was early for an ultrasound in a low-risk pregnancy, but you could never be too careful . . .
“I guess your next appointment will be a scheduled, routine ultrasound—if your insurance will cover it. You’ll get to see the baby.” Lucas forced himself to stop projecting and offered her a thin smile. She was just finishing the top button on her jeans, looping it through with a hair tie because her protruding belly was just large enough that she could no longer do up the button.
“Good.” She grinned at him.
“You can make the appointment at the front desk.” Lucas passed her a piece of paper and rested his hand for a moment on her arm. “Good luck,” he said sincerely, wishing her the best since he wouldn’t see her again; she was Elliot Townsend’s patient. He opened the door for her like a gentleman and she was gone.
Lucas stood for a moment in the silence of examination room number three, listening to his own heartbeat pound in his ears. With one hand he reached into his pocket and handled the ring concealed there. When his finger made contact with the cold metal, the absurdity of everything that had happened in the past few days suddenly became alarmingly clear. Dead bodies, stolen rings . . . and worst of all, another fight with Jenna. It didn’t matter. None of it mattered except Jenna, and upon realizing it, Lucas felt almost triumphant in his resolve.
He hadn’t even had a chance to show her the ring. And maybe it was better that way. She had had a little time to warm up to the idea, to absorb the shock of what had really happened. When he showed her the ring, she’d accept it, and they could say good-bye together. Start over.
Tonight he’d go home, apologize to Jenna, and try to put all of this insanity behind him. He’d fire up the grill one last time and make his famous grilled chicken and baby red potatoes and uncork a bottle of their favorite ten-dollar wine. They’d drink the entire bottle before they realized it was gone and then finish with ice cream eaten directly from the carton. Lucas made a mental note to stop by the grocery store on his way home and try to find the same chocolate cherry bordeaux ice cream they used to love in Chicago.
And over ice cream, he’d give her the ring. A gift. A peace offering. And maybe, just maybe, he would bring up the issue of adoption. His heart caught at the thought; he didn’t even know himself if it was from fear or anticipation. But he did know that it was time to at least let Jenna know that he was thinking about it. That maybe they could find their way back to each other if they cradled a baby between them.
Swinging out of the room, Lucas met Mandy in the hall and handed her the young woman’s file. “Next?” He asked quizzically, but there was still a light in his eyes from the heartbeat that continued to echo softly in his ears and the thought of ice cream on the floor of the living room with his wife.
“Oh, you’ll like your next patient.” Mandy pursed her lips so that he couldn’t tell if she was serious or not. Nodding her head at one of the doors, she handed him a chart.
“How ’bout a break first?” Lucas tested her, feigning exhaustion as he slumped against the hallway wall. “It’s not fair that Elliot and Scott get to take their holidays at the same time. How do you expect me to keep up with all of it?”
“You’re superhuman. It’s what heroes of your caliber do.”
“What can I say?” Lucas struck a Superman pose, right fist lifted in the air, and breezed
past Mandy, knocking briskly on the door of examination room one before he entered. He flashed Mandy a sly look and closed the door, turning his attention to his patient.
“You’re certainly in a good mood.”
Lucas looked up from the chart he was holding to find Alex sitting on the examination table. His legs were dangling off the side, and his hand was poised on his right leg, fingers balanced so that it looked like he was holding a cigarette between his first two fingers. It made Lucas laugh out loud.
“What’s funny?” Alex grunted.
“I hope you know you’re not allowed to smoke in here.” Lucas indicated his friend’s hand with a tip of his head.
Alex grunted and put his hands palm down on his knees. “I haven’t smoked in over ten years, but I still crave one when I’m stressed.”
“You stressed?”
“Always.”
“Join the club.” Lucas sighed and fell into the swivel chair opposite his friend. “So, are you here for personal reasons? Or professional?”
“Little of both. I came in to see if I could talk to you for a minute, but Mandy said you were too busy. As I was leaving, though, she asked me how my cold was doing.”
“She’s a shifty one, that Mandy,” Lucas said, silently thanking his angel of a nurse for finding at least a tiny break for him. “My appointments usually take fifteen minutes, so I guess that’s all we’ve got.”
“I don’t even need that much.”
As Lucas studied his friend’s face he realized for the first time since entering that Alex was not his usual jocular, sarcastic self. “Hey, you really are sick,” Lucas teased. “Where’s the witty comment, the mile-a-minute banter, the—”
“Stuff it.”
“Fair enough. What can I do for you?”
Alex cradled his forehead in one beefy hand. “Nothing, really. It just weighs on me, you know?”
“The case?” Lucas questioned, though he knew that the police chief thought of nothing else.
“Our chances of identifying this woman are slim to none. Rather, their chances. It’s not my case anymore, you know.”
“Unless it’s Angela,” Lucas said, ignoring the bitterness in Alex’s voice.
“The only dental records we have for her are fifteen years old. Jim took her to the dentist once. She was eleven.”
“So she had some permanent teeth. Enough for a match?”
“We’ll see. But the earrings were a definite dead end.”
“Earrings?”
“We found a handful of studs in the dirt of her grave. She must have had her ears pierced. Do you remember if Angela had pierced ears?”
“Double-pierced. Two on each side,” Lucas recounted.
Alex shrugged. “Doesn’t matter anyway. They’re department store cheapies. A dime a dozen. Millions of women across the United States must wear them.”
“What about interviews?” Lucas didn’t feel like having another argument over whether or not the body was Angela.
“Day and night,” Alex muttered. “We’ve talked to everyone who knew Jim, worked with Jim, lived near Jim, served in the Guard with Jim . . . liked him, hated him, and everything in between.”
“And?”
“People can hardly remember what they had for breakfast, much less what happened five years ago.”
“Five years?” Lucas repeated, surprised by the number. “They think the body has been in the ground for five years?”
“It’s not an exact science, but yeah. Give or take.”
Lucas tried to keep his face neutral as he took in the news. Angela had disappeared from Blackhawk eight years ago. What had happened in the three years between?
“I know what you’re thinking,” Alex said. “I’ve done the math, too. Either he had her hidden away in some yet-to-be-discovered den of horror, or it’s not her.”
“You know what I think.”
“Masochist. You’d go with den of horror every time.” But then Alex sighed, giving in. “Five to ten, Lucas. That’s the guess right now. The ground was so hard. And it was more clay than dirt. It was like she was preserved in concrete. We’ll know more in a couple weeks.”
Lucas managed a wry laugh, but his mind was on the ring. MINE. Was it some twisted token of ownership? He hated to imagine worst-case scenarios, but it was hard to stop his mind from tripping down frightening paths of terror and dread.
Suddenly, the innocent ring seemed crucial somehow. He almost took it out of his pocket. Offered it to Alex. Almost.
But a surge of defiance stopped him. The ring was Jenna’s. His. Theirs.
The rest of the day passed like an unstable weather front. Lucas tried to cheer himself with the thought of taking a few steps toward reconciliation with Jenna—supper and wine and honesty would go a long way, wouldn’t they? But the dejected slump of Alex’s shoulders as he walked out of the examination room left a lingering sense of turmoil that Lucas couldn’t escape.
By the time he left the clinic and slouched into his car, Lucas was short-tempered and mutinous. He wasn’t used to playing the part of the rebel. But it was intoxicating somehow, and as he started the car he reassured himself: They’ll know it’s Angela soon enough. And don’t forget the ice cream.
Thankfully, the supermarket was virtually empty and Lucas was in and out in less than five minutes: no cash register lineups, no awkward conversations that ended with “So do you think I should get this checked out?” And, sadly, no chocolate cherry bordeaux. The ice cream section changed seasonally, and though they had lived in Blackhawk long enough for it to be more home than any other place he’d ever lived, Lucas could never quite give up hope that their favorite flavor would one day magically appear. It never did, although praline ricotta gelato had once made a brief, extraordinary debut. It didn’t last long. He settled for Peppermint Stick and a bag of Double Stuf Oreos. Disappointing, but Lucas tried to cheer himself with the notion that at least they wouldn’t need to use spoons. The Oreos could do the scooping. That was romantic, right?
The drive down Blackhawk’s main drag, Highway 10, and through the tree-lined residential districts was reflex for Lucas. He didn’t notice the riding lawn mower that was taking up half the street except to swerve around it. He didn’t notice the ancient shade cast by oaks so old and enormous that their canopies intertwined across the street and created pools of sunlight on the concrete like a thousand golden coins. He didn’t pay attention to anything until he was cocooned in his kitchen, staring at the blinking red light of his answering machine. Past experience told him not to press Play, but he did all the same.
“Lucas, it’s Jenna. I’ve got a relocation tonight. I’ll probably sleep at the office.”
The house was static with Jenna gone, filled with questions and uncertainties. Lucas wandered from room to room, straightening up as he went because it was the only way he knew to clear his head. As he hung up one of Jenna’s shirts, put out fresh towels in the bathroom, and emptied the recycled paper bin in the den, Lucas found himself starting down a road that he wasn’t sure he wanted to be on.
Lucas hated himself with every ounce of his being, but it was as if an unfamiliar man held sway over his body as he stood before Jenna’s laptop. When he had swept through the den in his tidying frenzy, the matte black case of her Lenovo ThinkPad peeking out from behind the overstuffed chair where she did her writing had caught his eye. From that second on, the idea slowly took form, and although he tried to ignore its insistence, the next step on his self-appointed road to insanity would not be disregarded. The outrage of Angela’s shallow grave and the three unaccounted-for years made him almost irrationally furious.
“I’m sorry,” he muttered to no one in particular. But he didn’t mean it.
The metallic snitch of the case unzipping ripped through the house. Lucas twitched his head around, waiting for Jenna to step into the room and demand to know what he was doing. But all was silent, and now that he had committed the first violation, it was easier to continue. When the
computer was plugged in and Microsoft Windows blinked colorfully on the screen, Lucas felt his stomach turn over with a kind of excitement that made him feel somehow wild. Alive. He was taking control.
An icon labeled Case Files hung inconsequentially in the lower left-hand corner of Jenna’s desktop, and with his forefinger on the mouse pad, he carefully clicked it. A blue box labeled Password Required and a blank for typing it appeared.
Of course it would be locked with a password.
Lucas felt his conscience shudder. To strengthen his resolve, he reached into his pocket for Angela’s ring and slipped it on his pinky. It pinched his finger, a dirty, dejected reminder of why he was doing something that Jenna might never forgive if she ever found out.
The cursor flickered at him in the blank, demanding a password. Not quite knowing how or where to begin, he started with the most obvious: Jenna’s maiden name. Pecking at the keyboard, he typed RIVERS.
Incorrect Password.
It couldn’t be that easy. Racking his brain for anything and everything that might be important to Jenna, he tried again.
PEONY, her favorite flower.
Their first telephone number, 729-0098.
BEOWULF, the name of their chocolate lab who had been hit by a car last summer. And then BEOWOLF because he wasn’t sure if he had the spelling right.
GALAPAGOS, Jenna’s dream vacation destination.
Incorrect Password mocked him over and over.
Lucas continued to type, allowing his fingers to stumble in whatever direction they saw fit, though his options became slim and his determination wavered.
It was somewhere around the fifteenth try that Lucas realized with a start that he knew her password. It was a bit of a shocking thought—one that he pushed down and tried to ignore while he keyed in her mother’s maiden name and the make and model of their first car. But the word that crept from the back of his mind now crouched in plain view and waited to be acknowledged. The more he tried to ignore it, the more it made itself known. It was on his lips.
