Winter Winds

by Gayle Roper

  She looked at him in surprise. “I’ve always wanted to be a cop, Dad. You know that.”

  He ran his hand over her shining fall of black curls. “Sure, I know that, lovey. But it wasn’t real to me until today. It’s potentially dangerous work, and I’m suddenly thinking I don’t want my girl anywhere where she might be hurt.”

  She smiled and kissed his cheek. “Now, Dad, don’t turn chauvinistic at this late stage. And you know as well as I do that most cops never even fire their guns in the line of duty.”

  “That’s no great comfort,” he said. “Because there are many who do. And many who get hurt.”

  And killed, but he didn’t say it, and she was grateful for that.

  In the long run, it hadn’t been any of the Galloways who got killed in the line of duty but bright, shining, lovely Adam, her love, her life, her fiancé. And it hadn’t been in keeping the peace in New Jersey but in Bosnia.

  He’d gently chided her for crying when they parted. “I’ll be back before your tears dry, sweetheart.”

  And he almost was, in his box draped with a flag, the random victim of a land mine.

  How her father had worried about her then. She was in her final months at the academy, and she’d thrown herself into her training to keep the grief at bay. Thanks to the rigors of training, it worked during the day, but at night she wrapped her arms around her middle and curled up in pain.

  “God, I don’t understand. He loved You. And he loved me. Can You at least tell me why?”

  He hadn’t. All He’d ever whispered to her was, “Trust me, Maureen.”

  And she tried. Some days God seemed real, the One who cared for her above all. Other days He was as far from her as the east is from the west. She stood at graduation choking on tears of grief, anger, and loss.

  Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief. And help me be a good cop in Adams memory.

  Because she knew she was fragile, Maureen chose to seek a position on a force in a small town where the pressures would be less. She worked in the little town of Audubon, just the Jersey side of Philadelphia, for two years, then, feeling stronger emotionally and spiritually, moved to Camden, a small city looking for someone to work in the juvenile division. She spent three years in that particular emotional wringer, working with the small victims of heartbreaking crimes and their families. Then the job in Seaside opened up, and she grabbed it. For some reason, it just felt right.

  “I don’t remember you worrying like this about Bobby and Joe,” she teased her father the day she moved to Seaside. “And if you say they’re boys, I’ll have to hit you.” She smiled to show she wasn’t serious.

  “Well, they are,” Dad said, his black Irish eyes suddenly tearing as he ran a hand through hair as dark as hers but fringed at the temples with gray. “Your brothers are big strapping men, like me. You’re this tiny thing and skinny as a rail. I don’t think you’ve eaten since Adam died.”

  “Dad.” Maureen shook her head at his exaggeration. It was almost six years that Adam had been gone, and the pain at the mention of his name had passed. Her heart was still full of what-ifs and whys, but time had worked its healing magic, something she had originally thought impossible.

  “And you’re so cute,” Dad continued as if she hadn’t interrupted him. “Like your mother. What big bad perp’s going to listen to a sweet little thing like you?” He sniffed.

  “Now don’t go all gooey on me.” She hugged him, and he hugged her back, his bulk, as always, making her feel secure, safe. “You taught me to pray about decisions, and I’ve done that about this choice. In fact, I’ve done it for years. And I can’t think of anything else I’d rather do.” Except be Adam’s wife. The thought came automatically, and she pushed it aside, amazed and guilty at how easy it had become.

  Dad sighed. “It’s your mother’s fault.”

  Maureen had to laugh. “What?”

  He nodded. “If she weren’t so independent—”

  “If she weren’t so independent,” Maureen cut in, “she’d bore you to tears.”

  Her father grinned. “Haven’t had a boring day since I met her.”

  “Since you met who?” Mom asked as she walked into the room. “You have another woman hidden away somewhere that I don’t know about?” She walked to her husband and wrapped an arm about his waist.

  “Wouldn’t dare.” He wrapped his arms around her, rocking her from side to side.

  He wouldn’t want to, Maureen knew as she felt again the warmth of knowing her parents loved each other. Their marriage was just what she had wanted for herself and Adam. Sparks after more than thirty-five years.

  “He’s blaming you for my wanting to be a cop,” Maureen said. “You infected me with your independent spirit.”

  “I did?” Mom drew back. “Why, Sean Galloway, that’s the nicest thing you’ve said in a long while, even if it isn’t true. It was you and how handsome you looked in your uniform.”

  Now Maureen grinned as she sat in the hospital parking lot. What a wonderful heritage. She’d hoped to pass it on to her own children, but in the absence of that possibility, she’d just make her parents proud.

  With that thought in mind, she studied the white Saturn. She’d watched the occupants, Dori and a very handsome man, go into the hospital. Their faces had looked so serious that she almost believed they had someone in there they were worried about. Well, maybe they did; even bad guys had family members who got sick. She climbed out of her car and walked to the white Saturn. She called Greg. “Any word?”

  “The owner is one Phillip Trevelyan, 3142 Oystercatcher Way, Apt. 4B, Seaside.”

  “Ah.” So the handsome guy lived in Seaside. Interesting. She bent and peered in the windows of the car to see what she could see. “What else have you got?”

  “He’s a pharmacist.”

  She straightened. “He’s what?”

  “You heard me. He owns the pharmacy at Ninth and Asbury.”

  “Across from the Christian bookstore?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “What do you think? He borrowed the money to buy the store from Jankowski and is working it off by running his errands? Or he’s low on funds now and likes to eat, so he’s earning food money by running the errands? Or maybe he’s just a corrupt pharmacist who makes more money with illegals than in his store?”

  Greg grunted noncommittally. “His brother’s the pastor at Seaside Chapel.”

  Maureen frowned, not sure what to do with that piece of information. “That’s nice.”

  “Well, sit tight and don’t let them out of your sight.”

  “You know, Greg, I could break into the trunk and get the goods in a flash.”

  “If getting the stuff back were all there was to it, I’d say go ahead. But—”

  “But it’s Jankowski.”

  “Right. So be a good little shadow, and I’ll see you when I see you. Just keep in touch.”

  Maureen climbed back into the Camry and slouched in her seat. Was there anything as boring as surveillance? Look, Dad, no guns. She made a little face. No clue either, but we won’t talk about that.

  Four

  PASTOR PAUL TREVELYAN walked in the front door of his house in Seaside, New Jersey, and froze. “Ryan! What are you doing home?”

  The thirteen-year-old who had been lounging on the sofa watching TV stared wide-eyed at Trev but said nothing. His face was a study in conflicting emotions: shock, distress, antagonism, fear.

  It was the fear that hit Trev the hardest.

  Belatedly, the black lab who had been sprawled across Ryan’s lap jumped to the floor and raced to Trev. The dog wiggled and made little welcoming sounds in his throat. When Trev gave him the merest pat on the head, the dog butted him in the hip.

  Trev looked from Ryan to the dog and grinned. He loved this dog who’d seen him through a lot of lonely times. “Hey, Jack. How’s my boy?”

  Jack went wild with delight as he reveled in Trev’s energetic ear scratch.

  As he rubbed
the animal’s head, Trev tried to decide what to do about Ryan. The boy was supposed to be in school, not draped across the sofa watching daytime TV

  “What’s up, kiddo?” Trev finally asked. “Aren’t you feeling well?”

  “How come you’re home?” Ryan Harper countered, fake bravado coloring his voice. At least Trev thought it was fake. “You’re supposed to be at work.”

  Trev glanced at the clock. 10:30 AM. “Yeah, I am, but I just got an emergency call from my brother. Pop’s in the hospital. I’ve got to go to Pennsylvania for a couple of days.”

  Ryan sat up at that, his teen defiance giving way to uncertainty. “What about me?”

  Trev knew exactly how the boy felt. He had felt that same way when his parents had been killed. What about me? “Do you want to come with me?”

  “How sick is he? Hospital?”

  “Yeah, hospital.”

  “And you’ll be visiting there?”

  “As long as they let me stay.”

  Ryan made a face.

  “That’s what I thought.” Trev dropped his jacket on the stuffed chair. “That’s why I spoke to Todd’s mom. She said you could stay there through the weekend.”

  Ryan brightened and seemed to relax. A weekend with his best friend wouldn’t be too bad, though he was careful not to admit it. “So, when are you coming back?”

  “Today’s Friday. Probably sometime late tomorrow night. I have to preach on Sunday.”

  Ryan looked satisfied as he collapsed once again on the sofa, slumped so far that he was almost sitting on his neck. Trev marveled at the kid’s suppleness. Ryan was a little guy, skinny, undeveloped, and he hated himself for not growing. At his age he didn’t appreciate the fine mind he possessed, wishing only for a bigger body and some athletic prowess. Poor Ryan suffered from the curse of the nerd.

  Trev had seen pictures of the boy’s mother, Lucy, and she was a real looker. He expected the boy would one day be quite good-looking too. All he had to do was survive the years of growing up, an experience fraught with untold pitfalls even without the instability of Ryan’s present circumstances.

  Trev fought back the wave of sympathy he felt for the lonely boy. Even when your life was in the toilet, you had to go to school. The fact that you were smarter than many of your teachers didn’t alter the law. Neither did the fact that for you every day was an exercise in anxiety and social failure.

  Hooky was unacceptable.

  Ryan kept his attention firmly on the TV, apparently mesmerized by commercials for hemorrhoid ointment and denture fixative. Trev bit back a smile. Any topic was preferable to the lecture the kid knew was coming.

  “Well talk in a minute,” Trev said. “I want to get packed first.”

  Ryan grunted as denture cream gave way to Scrubbing Bubbles. “Whatever.”

  Trev made his way to the second floor. He pulled his duffel from the shelf in his closet and threw in enough for an overnight stay.

  Pop was in the hospital. Unbelievable. The man was never sick. The young Trev had secretly thought him invincible, the one man in history who would live forever. With his barrel chest and deep, hearty voice, he exuded strength and character.

  When Trev’s parents died, Pop was his lifeline. He and Honey wrapped him and Phil and Dori in a giant security blanket and stabilized a world gone madly atilt. Pop taught them love and responsibility. He taught them life.

  And now he was sick. A heart attack. An old person’s ailment.

  Oh, Lord, please don’t let Pop become an invalid. He couldn’t take it. I couldn’t take it.

  It was almost impossible to think of Pop as an old man, though Trev knew he was. People his age were subject to all kinds of ailments—strokes, heart attacks, cancers. But that was people in general, not Pop the Indestructible.

  Trev blinked against the sudden wash of tears that stung the back of his eyes. He grabbed his toothbrush and shaving tackle. Maybe this heart attack wasn’t all that serious. Maybe Phil had exaggerated.

  “When did this happen?” Trev had asked as he talked to his brother on the phone in his church office.

  “Last night about nine.” Phil sounded tired. “Honey and I’ve been at the hospital with him all night.”

  “And you’re just now calling me?”

  “Honey tried to get you last night, but there was no answer. When she got me, I drove right up. At midnight she decided to stop calling you, to wait until morning so you could have a good night’s sleep.”

  “But I was home all night,” Trev said. “Ryan and I watched some TV and ate ice cream.”

  “I don’t know, Trev. Maybe Honey called the church number by mistake. I never thought to ask.”

  “Yeah. There were a number of hang ups when I checked the messages this morning.”

  “He-he looks so vulnerable, Trev. Weary.” Disbelief filled Phil’s voice.

  Trev’s hand went to his heart, and he rubbed there as if he could make the pain of those words go away. “Maybe all they’ll have to do is Roto-Rooter his arteries or bring down his blood pressure or something equally doable.” Please, Lord, may it he so!

  “If the doctors know, they haven’t told us yet. When can you come?”

  “I’ll be there in a couple of hours. I’ve got to take care of Ryan first.”

  The brothers hung up, and Trev quickly cleared his calendar for the next two days. Then he rushed home to pack and caught Ryan.

  Now he zipped his bag shut and went downstairs. Ryan hadn’t moved, and Jack had climbed back onto the sofa and draped himself over the boy’s lap.

  “Will you and Todd stop by a couple of times tonight and tomorrow to take care of Jack?”

  Ryan reached a hand to Jack’s silky black head and fondled an ear. “You want me to take care of you, boy?”

  Jack grinned his doggie grin.

  Trev smiled at the dog. The one thing that had gone right since Ryan came to stay three weeks ago was the mutual affection between the boy and Jack. In fact, Jack had deserted Trev’s bed to sleep with Ryan, a fact that pleased the boy immensely.

  It was a simple case of someone caring, and Trev couldn’t begrudge the need for an extra blanket at night to replace Jack’s body heat. He knew all too well Ryan’s uncertainty because he’d felt it himself when his parents died, and he’d had Phil and Dori to help him get through it. Poor Ryan had no one. Well, he had Mae Harper, his grandmother, but she wasn’t available at the moment.

  The boy’s father had gone AWOL two weeks after Ryan was born and hadn’t been seen nor heard from since. His mother left her then two-year-old toddler with her mother so she might go to New York and become a famous Broadway star, an ambition she had still not achieved after eleven years. She deigned to visit Seaside once or twice a year as the mood struck her, but then she only stayed a couple of hours.

  For years Ryan’s only security had been his grandmother. Now Mae was in the rehab center on the mainland, trying to recover functions damaged in a terrible fall at her bookstore. Breaks in both hip and leg had required surgery and guaranteed it would be some time before she could return to work. All attempts to find Ryan’s mother to tell her of her mother’s injuries and her son’s need had failed.

  Trev went to the kitchen to get himself something to eat on the trip to see Pop. He opened the refrigerator and stared. There were no two ways about it: The worst part of living alone was having to feed yourself. And having a hungry Ryan around did not simplify the matter. For a little guy, Ryan ate an amazing amount of food. In fact, Ryan reminded Trev of a younger Jack, all big feet and unbelievable appetite.

  Finally Trev shut the fridge and pulled the trusty jar of chunky peanut butter from the cupboard. He slathered bread with it and a cholesterol-defying amount of butter and slid the sandwich into a plastic bag. He grabbed an apple, a pack of chocolate Tastykakes, and a bag of Herr’s chips. He went back to the refrigerator. There were two twenty-ounce bottles of Coke chilling there, and he grabbed one. He made a mental note to buy more.

&nb
sp; He stood quietly in the kitchen for a moment. What was he supposed to say to Ryan? His natural tendency was to make light of the crime, to be flip, to make it a joke. One day out of school was not going to ruin Ryan’s life nor cost him admission to a good college.

  So where was Lucy Harper when you needed her? Of course, she’d probably do a worse job than Trev if her past record was anything to go by. Missed birthdays. Unkept promises of visits. And Christmas might as well not exist for all the attention she paid her son at that time of year.

  No, the kid was probably better off stuck with an ignorant guy like himself, an ignorant guy who had no idea what to do but at least was present. Somehow Pop had always known how to handle him and Phil. So, what would Pop do?

  Who knew? Neither he nor Phil had ever bagged school. But if they had, there would have been plenty of sound and fury. He was sure of that.

  Sound and fury. Okay, Lord, give me the right words, please!

  His mental loins girded to deliver a telling lecture on school and responsibility of the thirteen-year-old kind, Trev walked from the kitchen. He stopped short at the sight of Ryan with his head buried in Jack’s neck and his arms wrapped around the dog. The boy’s nape looked so vulnerable, his skinny shoulders so fragile, that the lecture died before one word was spoken.

  Ryan straightened when he heard Trev’s footsteps. He tried to recapture the bravado he’d had when Trev first came home but failed miserably. All he managed was to look woebegone with a capital W. “I can just stay here with Jack. I can take care of myself, you know.”

  “I’m sure you can,” Trev said.

  “In fact, I can take care of myself all the time. Then I wouldn’t be a bother to you.”

  Trev blinked. “You aren’t a bother to me.”

  Ryan looked skeptical. “Whatever. But if I took care of myself, I wouldn’t have to go to school if I didn’t want to. Or church.” Ryan’s resentment at what life had dealt him bled out in every word. “I wouldn’t have to do anything I didn’t want to.”

  Trev nodded. “But how would you get to the store to buy your food? And where would you get the money to pay for it?”