Down To The Needle

by Mary Deal

  The thought of anything keeping them apart seemed unbearable. “Like what?”

  “I know in my heart that you and I belong together.”

  “That's what I wanted to talk about. We both have issues that need our attention.”

  “Abi, you're not getting my drift.”

  “Then don't drift. Say what you mean.” Their conversation wasn't harsh, but soft and patient.

  “Okay, let me put it this way.” He paused and held her chin. “We should have married by now.”

  His sudden mention of marriage startled her. They half-heartedly mentioned it in the past, but not knowing where Preston and Becky Ann were, and sensing they were most certainly alive, left Abi very much a married woman. Hearing Joe mention it in light of what was now taking place was beyond her ability to reason. Did he honestly believe marriage would keep him from falling prey to Margaret's capricious whims if she came back into his life? “It couldn't have happened, Joe. We both know that.”

  “Wait, let me explain.” He sat up and brought up his knees and pulled her up. He ran his fingers impatiently through his hair. “I don't want to go into what we may have to handle with either Megan or Margaret.” He relaxed his arms across his knees. “I want to talk about us. What I want you to realize is that if Megan is your daughter, her father's been dead for years.”

  The thought of it hit like a bolt of lightning. Abi had not had time to think about Megan and her dad that way. “But we—“

  “Abi, that's the reason Megan came to Seaport, remember? Her dad died and she came looking for family.”

  “All that's got to be proven.” Abi shook her head, trying to think it through. “Where are you going with this? I thought you didn't want to talk.”

  “About us, Abi. I want to talk about us. We'll sort this out together. When it's been proven, then we're getting married.”

  “You're assuming—”

  “No, I'm not assuming.” He drew her as close as they could get sitting facing each other on the floor. “I'm asking you, again, to marry me.” He looked straight into her eyes. “I've thought a lot about my history with Margaret. Sure, I will help her, if that's who that woman is, but there's no way on earth I'm going to allow anything to tear apart what you and I have.”

  She smiled sadly. That remained to be seen. “I'm glad to hear you say that.”

  “Why? Because I was such a puppet in the past?”

  “Joe, you can't say what's going to happen.”

  “You're doubting the strength of our relationship.”

  “No, I'm not. I'm openly willing to let this thing play out. There's a possibility of closure here for you. If you help her and can walk away and feel clean about the whole thing, you'll be free.”

  “You'd take that chance?”

  “Isn't that what real love is about?”

  “Then as soon as we're sure about Megan's dad, say you'll marry me?”

  “I-I can't say.”

  “Do you really love me, Abi, I mean, really? Despite the Winnaker case, we could have had Preston declared dead a long time ago and—”

  “Who doubts now?”

  “Then what do I have to do?” He smiled suddenly. “Hog-tie you and carry you on a pole to the altar?”

  She lifted her eyebrows a couple of times, teasing, as if the idea excited her. “What makes you think that's the only way you'd get me there?”

  “You mean you'd marry me?”

  “Well….”

  “Let's plan it, Abi. Everything's going to work in our favor. Let's get married.” He nibbled her ear and eased her back to the carpet. “I love you, Abi. I've never been surer of anything in my life.”

  “And I love you, Joe.”

  “Prove it.” They kissed hungrily, each matching the other's demands. Then he hovered above her, close to her face. “We have to be careful.”

  She felt his warm breath on her face. “Oh?”

  “If things heat up too much, this thick carpeting we sometimes use for a bed could go up in flame.”

  “Joe!” She playfully shoved him over to lie on his back with her on top. “Can't happen. We're too old to generate that much heat.”

  Later, as always, they lay in each other's arms talking about their emotions and how they loved one another. Their orgasms were always urgent, but it was the conversation afterwards that remained intrinsically sweet and enduring.

  The next morning Edith called to say that June had returned to The Beacon and said she would meet with Joe.

  Chapter 10

  Joe rushed into the store through Abi's office waving a folder. “I've got 'em!”

  Abi hurried down the aisle between the clothing racks toward her office. “Lindsay? No interruptions, please.” Always perceptive, Lindsay's dark floppy curls bounced as she approached. and reached for the door knob. “

  Lindsay smiled her cute obliging smile and closed the door. She was perfectly capable of running the store herself. Abi had recently thought of opening a second store across town and assigning management to Lindsay. She had been able to tutor Lindsay into being an astute businesswoman, like she would have done with Becky Ann had her daughter needed help with the business aspects of her career.

  Joe opened the folder and laid it on Abi's desk. The first computerized picture was of an older woman whom they hoped would resemble June. The image showed Margaret Griffin as she might have aged naturally. Margaret could have matured quite nicely, although aging would not have suited her. Perhaps the computer-aged image was how she might have looked without having lived on the street and been affected by the elements.

  They stood quietly, studying the images. Sadly, Abi found no resemblance between the computer-enhanced features and those of June's withered and sagging face, except that both had high cheekbones. “Could living on the street change her that much?”

  “Dunno, guess I'll find out in a couple of days,” He impatiently dismissed the thought with a wave of a hand.

  “This looks nothing like the woman Edith and I spoke with.”

  “Velma agreed that street life could produce abnormal deterioration but Velma's got a reputation of getting it right.” He studied the picture a little longer and ran a fingertip over the cheek in the image. “Then there's the matter of her skin.”

  “What about her skin?”

  “Velma said some people have a type of sick skin and muscle tissue that just doesn't age well. It sags more than is expected as time progresses.” He ran a finger over the chin and throat areas in the photo.

  Abi felt a wee bit intimidated. Joe, whose eyes were as probing as one of his camera's lenses, would know about such things. “Well, this looks nothing like June. She had those big discolored circles around her eyes.”

  “Guess we'll just have to see. You are coming with me, aren't you?”

  That came as a surprise. “With you, when you meet June?” Their meeting should be private and she was feeling confident enough to leave it that way. “I don't think so. That's between you and—”

  “No, it's not between just June and me. It includes you, me and June, or Margaret.” When he said the name Margaret, his eyes begged. He was afraid of possibly facing Margaret alone and getting caught in her web again. Yet, if he didn't trust himself to see this through on his own, how could she trust him in the future?

  “I-I can't go. I won't.”

  “I thought we were doing this together. After all, you've already met her.”

  “Well, yes, I have.” She shrugged. This was not important enough to argue over.

  “I understand that look on your face, Abi. I don't know how I'll react if June is Margaret. I could use your support.”

  “Okay, Joe. But what goes on, how you handle it, all that has to be your decision.”

  “Don't worry. I'll deal with it.” He smiled suddenly. His eyes teased. He turned over Margaret's enhanced likeness and moved it aside. He pulled the framed photo of Becky Ann she had previously given him from under the stack of computer enhancements in
the folder, along with the tattered photo from Abi's wallet. He kept smiling as he positioned them on the desktop. “Now look at this one.” He pulled another image from the stack.

  Abi gasped. “My daughter?” She couldn't take her gaze from the version of Becky's adult resemblance. “She's got my nose.”

  “She looks like you.”

  “Did you show Velma a picture of me too?”

  “Nope. She has no idea what you look like. Sometimes she uses the parents' images to create the older child but this time she didn't. She is curious, though, about how accurate she might have been.”

  “How did she know?” Abi picked up the page. “Becky looks like me when I was younger. She's got my slightly humped nose and my eyes.” She felt the familiar tightening inside her throat, signaling that uncontrollable tears would follow. “Is this what my daughter would look like today?” She clutched the picture to her chest as her eyes filled and overflowed.

  Joe wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “Pretty close, I'd say, considering how much this looks like you.” He turned to face her, smiling. “Did your lips pout like that?”

  “I-I guess they did. How did Velma know?”

  “Velma can look at a photo and literally see the skeleton and tissues under the skin. If this printout happens to look like you, well, it's what Velma saw beneath the skin of that little girl's face.” He smiled and pulled her closer. He kissed her temple. “And did you notice something else?”

  She held the picture at arm's length. “What?”

  “She's beautiful.”

  Abi's eyes kept filling and tears freely spilled over as she realized that this might be as close as she would ever get to her now grown daughter. “What I would give to know if she's alive.” To think Becky Ann would have grown to look like her. They could have passed for sisters. She had Preston's chin but that was about all. Abi thought of all the years of motherhood that had been snatched away, and about all the events in her daughter's life they would have shared.

  Anger began to choke her. She remembered that she had also wanted a son for Preston, who really wished for a boy. At least until the day Preston hobbled home after lying about an out-of-town meeting to cover up the fact he had had a vasectomy and wanted her to have nothing to say about it. But all that was in the past and unchangeable. Tears kept falling as she tried to control the rush of memories and jumble of emotions. The only thing to do was to stay positive and move forward and keep searching for Becky Ann.

  Joe squeezed her and rocked her gently. “Abi, haven't you noticed anything else?”

  She wiped her eyes. “What else?” She really couldn't think at the moment. She only wanted to stare at her daughter's image. “What else?”

  “This rendering doesn't look like Megan Winnaker.” The folder contained some pictures of the skinhead girl. “These are smaller photos of the ones I did for the Expo.”

  Abi retrieved a tissue from the box on the credenza and blew her nose. She drew in a breath to pull her emotions together, blinked to clear her vision, and dabbed at her eyes as she studied the photos spread alongside the computer aging of Becky Ann. Other than the fact that both were women, no noticeable similarities existed. The computer reconstruction of Becky produced a full, rounded cherub face of someone with a curly head of hair who would weigh more than the lean, gaunt-faced inmate.

  Megan Winnaker's eyes were larger and definitely closer together, with a sharp chin and cheekbones. Her lips were well formed and wide. Abi noticed again how flat and smooth Megan's nose was compared to Becky Ann's slightly humped bridge. In both the old photo and the computer aging of Becky Ann, the mole on her left cheek was prominent. Abi breathed in again, more in control, and sighed heavily.

  “Abi, there's something else I remembered only this morning.”

  She felt overwhelmed and wanted to sit alone and stare at her daughter's face. “What is it, Joe.”

  “The cabin.”

  “What cabin?” She hadn't taken her gaze away from the pictures.

  “Winnak… uh… Megan stayed there, for two weeks once.”

  She turned suddenly. “In your cabin?” She felt both relived yet irate that Joe had never told her of the depth of his involvement. “In the Tono Hills?”

  “It was like a vacation for her. She wanted solitude. I took her there so she'd have a place to stay and work on her art for a while.”

  Abi gasped. “The missing drawings—they might be there?” She and Joe had stayed at the cabin the few times their busy schedules allowed. The thought that more of Megan's art may have been in the cabin all along was shocking. “All this time?” She could only glare at him. Slowly, a couple of the puzzle pieces were coming together.

  Abi needed to somehow remain calm so she would not have to take yet another nitro tablet. Lately, she had been taking all too many.

  Joe stepped back from the desk. “You certainly can't be upset with me. I was merely trying to help the girl. She hadn't found a place to live before she was arrested.”

  “Do the police know about those pictures?”

  “Wait a minute.” He looked to be sorting his thoughts. “First of all, I don't know for a fact that any were left in the cabin, so how could I tell the police about them?”

  “The one's you saw, her earliest drawings, they had to be somewhere.”

  “That's right. Wanna' leave now?”

  Abi meant to follow every lead but this was unexpected. “Leave?” Dazed, she glanced at her watch. “It's past lunch time.”

  “We could be up there by sundown.” His smile begged. “Have a good night's rest among the pines, rummage through the place in the morning, and then head back.”

  Chapter 11

  “What about Det. Britto?” Joe had instructed him to call back as soon as possible. “We still need to follow up on that.”

  “He's got our phone numbers.” Joe kept his focus on the winding road. “I'll call him again and let him know what we're up to.”

  “How soon can we see her?”

  “Depends on her, I suppose. Plus, Britto has to go through her attorney.”

  All along the twenty miles from Seaport, heading inland toward Creighton, the countryside was blanketed with a profusion of Arroyo Lupine, California Poppies, and Cornflowers. Those had been the colors that Becky favored in pastel, inspired by wildflowers in springtime. Abi shook her head and forced herself to think of something else. Seeing the computer-aged photo of her daughter caused her to lapse into consuming thoughts and associations, much like past years when she was forced to turn to illusions to keep hope alive.

  She glanced at Joe, who usually remained quiet as he drove. “Why are we headed into Creighton?” That was not the shortest route to the foothills. “Why aren't we on the Interstate?”

  “I want to show you something.”

  A colorful fancy-plumed Langshan rooster sporting a bright red comb and surrounded by several small plump banty hens cackled and pecked their way across the narrow street in front of them as they approached an intersection. Small manicured maples and Farside trees grew along both sides of the street. In the lingering spring chill, a blaze of freesia, crocus and anemone filled the center dividers all the way through town. Vehicles jostled for parking places; delivery trucks double-parked. Local eateries offered brightly painted wooden tables and chairs on the sidewalks to offer respite in the sun for shoppers. A well-fed alley cat lay curled up under a table at someone's feet, waiting for a handout.

  “Remember those skinheads and gang members who live here?

  “Like Dara, the girl who testified against Megan?” Abi opened her window and breathed in the fresh air. Enticing aromas of restaurant specialties drifted in.

  “Yeah, her dad was instrumental in resurrecting this town. Look over there.” He pointed across the intersection. “That's one of his mini-mart gas stations.”

  Creighton had a life of its own. Restored dilapidated buildings exhibited some of the most interesting shops and galleries to be found between the
harbor at Pt. Meare all the way back to the Tono Foothills.

  “What was his name again, the boyfriend?”

  “Sling, Dara's cohort. Broke his arm in a motorcycle crash and wore a sling for a real long time. Every once in a while he wears one again, for attention maybe.”

  “Pathetic. You ever meet Dara?”

  “No.” He eased the vehicle up as close as possible to the crosswalk and leaned over the steering wheel. “Look there, down that street.” Again, he motioned past her. “See that bright blue awning down there? That's one of her father's, and the lot next to it. That's where police questioned Dara and Sling after Yates's house was torched.”

  “I'd read her father owns a lot of property.”

  “Mortgaged himself to his eyeballs and bought up everything that languished in a state of decay. People say he's real nice, committed to the community.”

  Abi suddenly leaned away from the window. “Oh, Joe, look over there.” She motioned with her eyes.

  Three guys and a couple of girls wearing black leathers and boots strutted down the block like a mini-gang. Cigarettes dangled from lips or protruded from loosely clenched demi-gloved fists. All wore multiple silver rings, earrings and belts. Various parts of their leather jackets and wristbands brandished pointed silver studs. Heavy silver chains swung from their waists. Everywhere skin shone from under clothing contained tattoos.

  Joe glanced nonchalantly. “Dregs. Members call themselves Dreggers.”

  “I thought silver studs went out decades ago.”

  One girl turned her head, flashing a row of shiny nose rings that did nothing but accentuate her ugly sneer. As they passed in the crosswalk, Abi glanced at one girl's low-slung pants that framed a bellybutton from which hung more silver and cheap jewels.

  Joe looked the other way. “Don't stare, Abi.”

  “These people don't look like neo-Nazis.”

  “They only think they're neo. What they are, plain and simple, are aging juvenile delinquents who decorate themselves with all the trappings of the S&M cult.”

  “And Dara and Sling?”