Devlin's Light

by Mariah Stewart

  A Sunday morning mirage if ever there was one, she couldn’t help but think.

  “Are you two going to get up, or do I have to come in there and get you up?”

  “Corri’s still asleep,” she whispered.

  “No she’s not.” The child stretched, her thin arms reaching out from under the blue and white blanket.

  “Are you ready for waffles?”

  Corri’s head shot up.

  “With warm syrup?” she asked hopefully.

  “And blueberries,” Nick told her.

  “Yum!” The blankets fairly flew from the end of the bed, and Corri’s little feet hit the ground running. “My favorite breakfast. My very favorite breakfast.”

  She was down the steps before India had a chance to sit up. When she did, Nick was leaning over her, his lips seeking hers.

  “I cannot resist a tousled woman,” he told her, kissing her softly at first, then with more persistence than she had expected. “Maybe I was a little too gallant last night. Maybe I need my head examined.”

  “Maybe we should eat those waffles before Corri does,” she said, smoothing the hair back from his face.

  “Hmmm.” He grunted. “It’s the story of my life: ‘You’re cute, Nicky, but given the choice between you and your waffles, well, it’s, Please pass the syrup.’”

  “Somehow I doubt that very much.” She laughed and emerged from the cocoon she had made from blankets and sheets.

  “You really are adorable in the morning, you know that?” He took two steps toward her and she hesitated just long enough for him to catch her by the arms and kiss her again. The same three alarms that had gone off between her ears the night before began to whine.

  “Nick…”

  “Hey you guys, the syrup is all bubbly all over the stove,” Corri called up the steps.

  “Stay away from it, Corri. I’ll be right there.” He kissed India’s nose and frowned. “I’m beginning to wonder if this kid is a blessing or a curse.”

  India laughed and watched his handsome form trot down the steps.

  “Hey, you guys both have sweatshirts and jeans on,” Corri observed as India strolled into the kitchen ten minutes later. “I’m going to wear a sweatshirt and jeans too.”

  She hopped from her chair and sped up the steps.

  “How were the waffles?” India touched Corri’s shoulder fondly as the child passed by.

  “Dee-licious.”

  “Brush your teeth,” India called up the steps as Corri’s small figure disappeared around the corner of the bedroom door.

  “Those are cold.” Nick pointed to the two waffles remaining on the plate in the middle of the kitchen table. “I’ll make a few more.”

  “These are fine,” she told him. “I’ll put them in the microwave.”

  “Won’t they get soggy?” He frowned.

  “Nah, they’ll be fine.” She opened the glass door to the small appliance, slid the plate in and set the timer. “I take it you ate with Corri?”

  “There are some things a man cannot wait for.” He grinned. “Waffles are one of those things.”

  He poured her a cup of coffee and placed it before her on the table and she smiled her thanks. The microwave beeped that it had completed its task. She removed the plate and poured syrup over the waffles.

  “I see you’re not a butterer,” he observed.

  “What?”

  “You don’t butter your waffles before you pour on the syrup.”

  “Which are you?”

  “Oh, I’m a butterer.” He nodded as if they were discussing something of great importance. “Corri is a butterer too, just for future reference.”

  “These are great,” she told him. “Wonderful. But where did you find stuff to make waffles with? I haven’t shopped in weeks, except to grab the hamburger and salad things from the food market on my way home Friday night.”

  “I found all this”—he waved his arm across the counter—“in the market at the corner two blocks away.”

  “Thank you, Nick.” She put her fork down and watched him as he picked up his plate and began to rinse it off. “Has anyone ever told you that you are one amazing man?”

  “Certainly. But darlin’, when I decide that it’s time to amaze you, you won’t believe your—”

  “See? Now we all are dressed alike,” Corri said brightly as she dashed into the room.

  “We see,” India said, both she and Nick laughing at the child’s timing.

  “Can I play in the leaves outside?” Corri peered through the kitchen window. The day was clear and crisp, and an overnight wind had dotted the back yard with a carpet of colors, which could be raked into a pile just right for jumping into.

  “Sure,” India told her, “there’s a rake in the shed. Just stay in the back yard, Corri. Don’t go out front.”

  “Okay.” Corri tugged at the back door and Nick unlocked it for her.

  “Is the shed open?” he asked.

  “I don’t remember.” India frowned and started to rise.

  “I’ll do it. Stay and finish eating before your waffles get cold again.”

  As the door closed behind him, India took her plate and fork and went to the window, watching Nick stride across the yard.

  Admit it, you like his rear view, she chuckled. And the front view ain’t bad either.

  By the time he had returned to the kitchen she was seated at the table, polishing off the last of the waffles.

  “This was wonderful.” She sighed. “You didn’t have to do this.”

  “Hey, what kind of a man would accept a night’s lodging without earning his keep?” He grinned. “Besides, I wanted to impress you with my many talents. I’m a very good cook.”

  “Do you do everything as well as you cook?” She grinned back.

  “Most things. Of course, there are some things I do even better.”

  “Hmmm. I guess it’s up to me to figure out what those things might be.”

  “And one of these fine days you will, Miss India. Now pour yourself another cup of coffee and turn those teasing eyes away from me or young Corri will get the shock of her life when she comes back through that door and finds us both on the kitchen floor, you up to your ears in my talents.”

  India laughed again, wondering when she had ever laughed this much in one single morning. It must have been a very long time ago. The thought sobered her and she spun the spoon around and around in her coffee until the swirls resembled a tiny mocha-colored whirlpool. She felt younger today than she had in a very long time. It felt wonderful.

  “What did you say?” She tuned back in at the sound of his voice.

  “I asked you why you freaked out on that man, Carson, yesterday at the museum.”

  “I don’t know.” She turned her face from him abruptly. “Of course you do.” Nick sat down next to her at the table. “What did you think he would do to Corri?”

  “Hurt her,” whispered Indy.

  “Why?”

  “Because it happens. Because children are hurt by strangers who look every bit as respectable as Mr. Carson looked. Child molesters are ministers and they are teachers and librarians, and you can’t trust anyone with a child.” She was unaware that her voice had risen until Nick took her hands. “I have to protect her, Nick. I can’t let anything happen to her.”

  “Nothing will happen to her, Indy. We will take care of her. Nothing will happen to Corri.” There was a sureness about him that made her almost believe him. “But I would like you to tell me why you are so afraid for her.”

  India struggled to get a sound out, but nothing would come.

  “India, come here.” Nick turned his chair around and pulled her onto his lap, holding her like a child. He put his big arms around her and she felt safe, really safe. “Do you trust me enough to tell me about it?”

  She sat listening to his heart for what seemed to be a very long time. When she realized that she could finally speak of the unspeakable, she began in a very soft small voice.

>   “It was such a hot day that you couldn’t walk barefoot on the beach, the sand burned your feet. Lizzie and I had played all day, but not on our beach.” She gestured as if sitting on the back porch of August’s house, pointing in the direction of the beach at the end of Darien Road. “It was the beach over off Longview. It’s right on the bay, and there’re better shells there. And more driftwood. We collected driftwood and pretended we were pioneers, gathered around the campfire. We took seaweed that had washed up on the shore and pretended it was logs for our cabin. We laid out a cabin on the sand, outlined with seaweed. We played house all afternoon. Several times I went home and got popsicles for us. The last time Aunt August said we’d had enough, that we’d spoil our dinners. But we wanted just one last one anyway. Lizzie wanted to come with me, but I told her to wait for me on the beach, since it would be easier for me to sneak into the kitchen alone. And I left her there, left Lizzie on the beach and went back to the house. I waited on the back porch until I heard Aunt August go upstairs, and I snuck in and took two more popsicles out of the freezer and ran back to the beach. Lizzie wasn’t there. I called and called, but she wasn’t there. I figured maybe her brother had come to get her. So I sat down on the dune and I ate both popsicles. Mine and Lizzie’s. Then I washed my hands off in the bay—they were sticky and red from the popsicles—and I went home. I ate dinner and I caught lightning bugs in the back yard with Ry.”

  She leaned back in his arms and sighed. Her voice was steady, but it had a dreamy sort of quality, as if she was telling of something she could see through a haze.

  “Lizzie’s brother came over around seven-thirty. He’d come to get Lizzie to walk her home. Lizzie hadn’t gone home.”

  She stopped again and sat up, her breath coming a little faster now, though she was clearly striving for control.

  “When she hadn’t gotten home by eight, all the grownups were worried, and one by one, all the parents sort of drifted out to look for her. I stayed home with Ry and we watched TV. I remembered feeling very, very scared. I had no idea where Lizzie had gone, but I knew—I KNEW—that something very bad had happened. They didn’t find her that night. I don’t think anyone in Devlin’s Light got a wink of sleep. All the parents went out again in the morning to look.”

  India swallowed hard, and Nick knew that the hardest part was just ahead. He stroked her arm gently with a big open hand and waited until she could go on.

  “They found her in the marsh over by the fishing pier at the other end of town.” Her voice had gone flat and had a hollow sound to it, as if to distance herself as much as possible from the very words she uttered. “She had been raped and stabbed to death. While I sat on the dunes, eating her popsicle, someone was raping and murdering my friend.”

  Her voice faded to a whimper, and she began to cry, silently at first, then huge, painful sobs that racked her chest and tore at her throat. Nick held on, steady and sure, while it swept through her, waiting patiently for it to subside, and knew that he had found the key to India Devlin. The child’s guilt had become the woman’s obsession.

  When the sobbing stopped, he asked gently, “How many will you have to convict, sweetheart, how many will you have to put away, before you can forgive yourself?”

  Chapter 14

  Corri stood in the doorway, ashen, her eyes wide with terror.

  “Did Aunt August die?” she asked solemnly, her bottom lip trembling like tall grasses set dancing by a stiff wind.

  “No, sweetie, Aunt August didn’t die.” Poor baby, India thought, that the sight of someone crying could only mean the death of someone important in her life. India opened her arms and the child walked slowly into them.

  “Then why are you crying?”

  “Because I was thinking about a friend I lost, long ago, and it made me feel sad.”

  “Did your friend die?”

  “Yes. Yes, she did.” Indy helped Corri climb onto her lap.

  “Why did she die?”

  “Because a very bad man hurt her.”

  “Like the bad men you send to jail?”

  “Exactly like them.”

  Corri twirled a strand of hair around her index finger, then watched it unwind.

  “That’s why you have to be in Paloma? Because that’s where all the bad men are?”

  “No, not exactly. There are bad men everywhere.”

  “Even in Devlin’s Light?”

  “I suppose there could be.”

  “Why do you have to send the bad men from Paloma to jail but not the bad men from Devlin’s Light? Who sends them to jail?”

  “The county district attorney.”

  Corri’s eyes brightened. “I think you should come back to Devlin’s Light and make sure that all of the bad guys are in jail. You could help the distant attorney—”

  “District attorney.”

  “You could help him so that there would be no more bad guys in Devlin’s Light.”

  “Keep going, Corri. You’re doing a fine job,” Nick stage-whispered conspiratorially.

  “I guess you wouldn’t want to move to Paloma and live here with me.” India ran her fingers through Corri’s hair.

  Corri sat up like a shot, studying India’s face for a sign that she was teasing her.

  “I can see that’s an idea that has no future.” India tried to smile.

  “What would Aunt August do without me?” the child asked earnestly, with no hint of conceit. “She always says she doesn’t know what she’d do without me, Indy.”

  “Well, there is that.” India pondered the situation. The look of sheer panic that had crossed Corri’s face put an end to any thoughts India might have had of bringing her to Paloma to stay. “Maybe I should just do the smart thing here.”

  “Which is…” Nick asked, wondering what would qualify as a smart thing in India’s present state of mind.

  “Maybe I should finish up this case, then take a leave of absence when it’s over. What do you think?” She turned to Nick.

  “I think it’s a wonderful idea.” Nick grinned broadly.

  “I don’t know what it means.” Corri shrugged.

  “It means that instead of staying here in Paloma, I would take some time off and not work for a while.”

  “Like a vacation?”

  “A very long vacation.”

  “How long?” Corri asked cautiously.

  “Pretty long. Maybe three months or so.”

  “That sounds like a long time.” Corri thought this over. “You mean you’d be in Devlin’s Light with me and Aunt August, for a long time?”

  “Umm-hmm.” India nodded.

  “That would be very good.” Corri tried to contain herself.

  “Very good,” Nick whispered in India’s ear.

  The three of them snuggled for a long moment, India on Nick’s lap, Corri on India’s.

  “We’re like a little family,” Corri observed innocently, “only we’re not.”

  “Family is where you find it,” Nick reminded her.

  “Like I found Indy and Aunt August after Ry,” Corri said.

  “Right.”

  “That would be very good,” Corri repeated.

  “How long do you think the trial will last?” Nick asked.

  “Depends on how many witnesses actually show up.”

  “You sound worried.”

  “I’m always worried about someone like Alvin Fletcher slipping through my fingers.” She sighed. “He’s smart and he’s rich and he’s resourceful. He has to be watched like a hawk. He’s been arrested before and has always managed to wiggle away. I don’t want that to happen this time.”

  “Then I guess that we should get out of your way and let you prepare for tomorrow.”

  “I like you being in my way.” She turned her face to him slightly. “I could get used to having you in my way.”

  “Do we have to leave now?” Corri frowned.

  “What did you have in mind?”

  “I wanted Nick to help me build the biggest
pile of leaves in the world so I could jump in them.”

  “Well, you could do that while I work for a while.” India wasn’t ready to have them leave. It felt too good. Her house felt too good with them there. She felt too good with them there.

  “Sounds like fun to me.” Nick placed his hands on Indy’s hips to propel her forward and off his lap.

  “Only Indy has to jump in it too,” Corri told them. “Me and Nick will build it, but everyone has to jump in it.”

  “Deal.” India stood up, taking a giggling Corri with her.

  Setting up her files on the dining-room table, India organized her work into piles. Statements from witnesses. Forensic evidence. Photographs. Copies of files from other jurisdictions where Fletcher had been arrested over the past eight years. As she read through, file to file, she took notes on a yellow legal pad, notes that would later become her opening statement. She was totally immersed when Nick came in to tell her that the pile was ready for her jump.

  He leaned over her right shoulder and placed a kiss on her temple, then froze.

  “That’s a pretty nasty photograph,” he said, noting the top picture on the pile.

  “Alvin Fletcher’s last victim,” India told him. Searching through a pile of photos, she found the one she sought and held it up. “This is what Barbara McKay looked like before he got his hands on her.”

  He did not reply. No words were necessary. The smile of the bright-eyed teenager spoke of a girl who was confident, happy, pretty.

  “And this is what she looks like today.” The third photo depicted a young woman with frightened eyes and no expression whatsoever.

  “Wow,” was all he could say.

  “Right. Wow.” India shook her head. “Alvin Fletcher ruined this girl’s life. Ruined her life. Destroyed everything she had been before the night she had the unfortunate luck to have crossed his path.”

  Her jaw hardened as she spoke, her shoulders squared, as if setting off for battle. She looked up at him and watched his face as he looked at the three photographs of the young woman. She thought that maybe he was beginning to understand.

  “Do you have time for a jump in the leaves?”

  “Is that anything like a roll in the hay?” She tried to smile as she slid the photos back into their protective sleeve.