by Marta Perry
She set off, and he caught up with her in a few long strides. He took her arm, his grip tightening when she tried to pull away.
“All right, all right. But you’ll stay close to me.” He didn’t make it an option.
She jerked a nod, and together they walked to the canopy. The metal folding chairs were cold with an intensity that pierced through fabric to skin. The pastor must have realized that, as he kept the interment mercifully short. A final scripture, a final prayer, and then they stood together as the casket was lowered into the earth.
“The Lord is my Shepherd…” Pastor Davison began, and the others joined him in saying the familiar words. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death… Had Ruby remembered that the Lord was holding out His hand to her in that final moment?
Jade seemed to tremble, as if her legs wouldn’t hold her up any longer. Micah clamped his arm around her as the final amen was said. The sooner they got out of here, the better.
“It’s not going to take much more time to see Ruby’s apartment.” She understood Micah’s urgency to get her away from Brownsville, but this might be her only chance to understand her sister’s life, if not her death. “What harm can it do?”
“It’s running an unnecessary risk.” Micah sounded as if he was gritting his teeth. Still, he pulled up at the old home where Ruby’s apartment was on the second floor.
“Let’s make it brief, okay?”
“Yes, of course,” she said as she got out. She was getting what she wanted, so she’d try to be agreeable. “Pastor Davison said he’d make arrangements to have the apartment cleared and donate everything to charity, once I’ve taken anything I want to keep. And after all, it would look odd if I just left. I suppose if I weren’t here your office would handle that.”
“We would.” He didn’t sound convinced that this was a good idea, but he led the way up the narrow stairway. At the top, he held out his hand for the key.
“I can get it.…”
He took the key Pastor Davison had provided out of her hand. “I’ll go in first. Stay put.”
The steel in his voice reminded her that danger might still exist, even here. She nodded, standing pressed against the wall while he unlocked the door, eased it open and then disappeared inside.
“Okay, come in.” He held the door for her. “It’s been searched, both by the shooters and by the crime scene team. They tried to put things to rights afterward. There’s no way of knowing if anything is missing.”
Her stomach clenched. She walked into the rooms where Ruby had spent the last months of her life. The apartment was small and old-fashioned, but Ruby must have made an effort to brighten it up. She’d put a bright quilt on the sagging sofa and hung prints of Montana scenes on the walls. The kitchen was in one end of the living room, and the table against the window must have been Ruby’s dining room.
“There’s not much to it.” Micah opened the door on the opposite side of the room. “The bedroom and bath are through here.”
A framed photo of a group of women sat on one of the end tables. She picked it up. They were posed around a Christmas tree, and Ruby was reaching up to put an ornament in place, her face relaxed and smiling. Her throat tightened. Ruby had enjoyed that moment. She looked younger than Jade remembered her, with her usual air of bored cynicism gone.
There wasn’t much else to see in the living room. No books, but then, Ruby never had been a reader.
“Anything personal is probably in the bedroom.”
Micah seemed to be reading her thoughts.
“Right.” She wouldn’t be a coward about it. She went quickly into the bedroom.
The closet and dresser contained only the things anyone would expect to find. The only surprise was that Ruby’s taste in clothes had undergone a change. Gone were the flashy outfits, miniscule skirts and high-heeled boots. She’d apparently switched to jeans and sweaters, with a few pairs of good slacks and jackets. She turned slowly to face the bed. Things that meant the most to someone would usually be there, in the nightstand, and she was oddly reluctant to approach. She forced her feet to move. The nightstand was topped with a few books. She’d have to revise her opinion. Maybe Ruby had learned to enjoy books in recent years. She picked them up.
A devotional guide, a women’s Bible study book. A Bible.
“Jade.” Micah had approached while she’d stood there staring at the books. “I understand there’s something in Ruby’s Bible that affects you.”
She glanced up, to find his brown eyes filled with sympathy. Then she opened the Bible and unfolded the newspaper clipping that lay inside the front cover. Her own face stared up at her. It was the article that had appeared in the paper when she’d taken up her appointment to the county library. She stared at it blankly.
“How…how would Ruby get this? It was in the Billings paper.”
“Maybe she’d been looking.” His voice was very gentle. “After she let you know where she was going, she could have been tracing your whereabouts pretty easily on the Internet. You weren’t trying to hide.”
“She knew where I was.” The words came out in a whisper, because her throat was too tight to allow for anything else. “She kept this.”
The enormity of her loss hit her then. She’d never see Ruby again. Never be able to say she was sorry for the lost years, for the pain that lay between them. For the times when she might have led Ruby away from her destructive life and hadn’t.
“Maybe she intended to get in touch directly, once she was satisfied that it was safe. She wouldn’t have wanted to put you in danger.”
She heard his words, even understood them, but it was as if he spoke from a great distance.
“She’s gone,” she said, grief ripping through her.
“She’s gone.”
FIVE
She’d had all she could take. If Micah had doubted the depth of her feeling for her sister, he couldn’t doubt it now.
“Come on. There’s nothing more for you here.”
Holding her firmly, he guided her to the door. She didn’t argue, didn’t resist. He was taking advantage of her grief to get her out of here. To get his own way. What did that make him?
A marshal, doing his job, like any other law enforcement professional would. It was his responsibility to keep her safe, and the safest place for her right now was anywhere away from Ruby’s life and death. Jade wouldn’t let go of the Bible and other books, so he took them, too, tucking them under his arm as he piloted her out of the apartment. If he was any judge, she wasn’t going to hang on to her control much longer. He locked the door and pocketed the key, then turned to her. She leaned against the wall, her eyes closed, her face dead-white.
“It’ll be okay.” Meaningless words, but he had to say something. He took her arm and led her down the stairs and out into the parking lot.
She seemed to rouse a little when the cold air hit her.
“The books…”
“I have them for you.” He got her into the vehicle and put them on her lap. “There you are. Just relax, now. There’s nothing else you can do here.”
Nothing else she, or anyone, could do for Ruby. Whatever guilt and regret she felt, he shared. He climbed in the driver’s side and started the engine.
“I’ll take you home. You’ve had enough for one day.”
She nodded, her lips pressed tightly together, her eyes clouded. She clasped the books on her lap as if they were a precious cargo.
He threaded his way back through the winding streets of the small town, headed for the highway. He watched the rearview mirror as he went, alert for anyone following them. Nothing. Still, that supposed cousin had been in Brownsville not much more than twenty-four hours earlier. He could still be around, even if he hadn’t openly attended the funeral.
He didn’t know what the man’s purpose was, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out that most likely, it wasn’t anything good.
They could have the local cops question Mrs. Calloway again
, maybe get a better description of the man. The locals would rouse less talk than sending a team of marshals in.
Flipping open the cell phone, he put in a call to the office and described the situation briefly, setting things in motion. This could just be one of those odd coincidences that turned up in every case, seemingly meant to convince the investigator of the randomness of events.
Or it could be important. He wasn’t taking any chances. When he’d finished the call, he ventured another glance at Jade, hoping to see her recovered. But she was huddled into the corner against the door, hand over her mouth, obviously trying hard to stifle her sobs.
“I’m sorry.” The words were pitifully inadequate. “I’m so sorry for your loss.”
Guilt gnawed at him. He’d been relieved that her breakdown enabled him to get her safely away without any further delays. That wasn’t much of a Christian response, was it?
She shook her head, sobs twisting her body. He clamped his teeth together, hands tight on the wheel. The sensible thing to do was to keep driving, get her home as swiftly as possible.
But he couldn’t bear to watch her grieve without trying to comfort her. Maybe that wasn’t the professional response, but it certainly was the human one. Snowplows had widened a space near a row of metal mailboxes that must serve the dwellings out of sight down a narrow country lane. He pulled over, put the gearshift in Park, and drew Jade close to him.
He half expected her to pull away, but she didn’t. Maybe her grief was too deep for her to realize anything other than the need for comfort. She turned her face into his shoulder and let her tears flow.
He stroked her hair, murmuring the kinds of soft phrases his mother had used when he was small. It’s going to be all right. Neither of them really believed that, but she needed to hear it right now. Her hair was soft against his cheek, and a complicated mix of tenderness and protectiveness flowed through him.
He shouldn’t be doing this…shouldn’t be touching her, shouldn’t be caring about her.
But he didn’t regret it for an instant. Jade cried until no more tears would come. She hadn’t realized it was possible to weep so much—for Ruby, for the years they’d lost, and even for herself, that she’d have to go on without her twin.
Involuntary spasms shook her, and her eyes were hot and swollen. She was aware of that first. Then, slowly, she realized that her cheek was pressed against the soft wool of Micah’s sweater. His arms wrapped around her securely. Comforting her. She felt the steady beat of his heart. His hand moved, stroking her hair. “It’s going to be all right,” he murmured.
It took a massive effort to draw away from all that warmth and support. Slowly, reluctantly, she drew back. Her gaze focused on his face.
All that iron control, that professional facade, had been stripped away, showing her the caring, gentle man he really was.
She put her hands to her wet, hot cheeks, embarrassment making them even hotter. “I’m sorry.” Her voice was thick. “I didn’t mean to cry all over you.”
“It’s okay.” His voice was husky. “You haven’t had much space for grieving in the past few days. It can be cleansing to cry it all out.”
She drew in a shaky breath. Maybe he was right. She felt drained, but better. Emptier, somehow. Realizing that his arm still encircled her, she slid back into her own seat. He dropped his arm instantly, reaching instead for a water bottle and holding it out to her. “Here. Maybe you’d better rehydrate.”
“I guess I should.” She took a long gulp of the cold water, wishing she could splash it on her face. “I didn’t know I had that many tears in me. Ruby and I—we led separate lives for so long.”
He handed her a fistful of tissues from a box behind the seat. “I don’t have a twin, just a much older half brother. But I’d guess the bond runs pretty deep, no matter how far apart you are.”
“Yes, I guess it does.” Her memory slid back through the years, back to the earliest times, before they’d drifted apart. “She was there as long as I can remember. She was the last person I saw when I fell asleep at night and the first one I saw when I woke up in the morning.”
No matter what the dump had been like that they’d lived in, she’d always been able to count on that. She and Ruby would have been together, even if they had to sleep on a blanket on the floor.
“Those early memories are the ones we always come back to, in the end. They’re the ones that matter.”
“Are you a psychologist, as well as a marshal?”
“Just someone who’s experienced loss.”
She managed a watery smile. “I’d rather think of those days. Bad as they were, things got worse later.” She sucked in a breath, trying to still the leftover sobs.
“Maybe the truth is that I separated myself from Ruby in my need to get away.”
His fingers closed over hers in a reassuring grip. “You did what you had to. It took a lot of courage and determination to get where you are now.”
“Not courage,” she said quickly. “I told you. Ruby had all the courage.”
He turned in the seat a little, leaning against the door to watch her. “There are different kinds of courage. You made something of yourself against terrible odds.”
“I had help.” She’d never have done it on her own.
“There was a librarian who took an interest in me. And a woman who ran an inner-city mission. They had absolutely nothing in common, except me. Together, they were a formidable pair.”
“You still had to do the work. And I’m sure they wouldn’t have put themselves out for you if you hadn’t shown you had it in you to succeed.”
What had they seen in her, those two strong women? Had they just recognized her desperation or something more?
“Ms. Henderson badgered everyone she knew to give me jobs where I could have a safe place to study as soon as I was old enough. She must have searched every scholarship program in the country to find the funding so I could go to college. And Sister Sally…” She couldn’t think of the woman they’d all called Sister Sally without a lump in her throat. “Sister Sally taught us self-defense and Christ, sometimes in equal measures.”
“What happened to them?”
The lump was back in her throat, but she couldn’t cry any more. “Sister Sally opened her door to one too many addicts. She was killed for the few dollars she had in the mission box—dollars she’d have spent on people who needed it, instead of herself.”
“I’m sorry. Did they get the perp?” His voice deepened on the words. Probably, like the law officer he was, he wanted to see justice done.
“Yes. But that didn’t do her any good.” She shook her head. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to snap. I’m sure she forgave him the instant it was done. That’s who she was. Tough, strict, but with a heart for any kid who was hurting.”
“And Ms. Henderson?”
“She came to graduation when I received my degree in library science. She was retired to Florida by then, but she wouldn’t miss that. We still talk often.”
She should call her. Tell her about Ruby. Or at least, tell her as much as she could.
“So she’s why you became a librarian.” Micah sounded satisfied at having one piece of her history organized.
“She’s certainly the kind of librarian I want to be…the sort of person who is a resource to her whole community. Not the stereotypical old maid with glasses and her hair in a bun, saying ‘Shh’ all the time.”
He chuckled, reaching out to touch the wild tangle of her hair. “I don’t think you’d ever be that.”
She smiled back at him, the smile lingering for a moment, like his hand on her hair, and then fading. “Thank you, Micah. I don’t…I don’t know how I’d have gotten through today without you.”
“You’re welcome.” His gaze warmed, and the back of his fingers touched her cheek, heating her skin. She couldn’t seem to catch her breath. She could only look at him, seeing the awareness in his eyes that must surely be written in hers, too. There was no sound, bu
t she imagined she could feel the beating of his heart, as she had when she’d been in his arms.
He drew his hand away slowly, and it seemed to take an effort for him to turn, looking at the road ahead. He cleared his throat. “I guess we should get going.”
“Yes.” Her voice didn’t sound natural to her. “We have a long drive.”
And every mile of it, she’d be denying to herself that she felt anything at all for him.
The background checks on Jade Summers had come through promptly. Micah sat at his desk the next day, scanning them carefully, aware as he did so of how much Jade would hate having her life laid out that way for him to see.
She was a private person, very different in that respect from her twin. Even when life was beating her down, Ruby had remained outgoing and feisty. Maybe that had been her defense against the world that hadn’t given her much of a fair start.
Jade had reacted to that same beginning by turning inward, taking her refuge in books. He’d guess she trusted rarely, if ever.
That made her breakdown in his presence all the more remarkable. Today she was probably regretting that bitterly. He’d guess the next time they met she’d be at her iciest, in order to deny those moments when she’d wept in his arms.
And what about that other moment, when he’d touched her and they’d seemed to see into each other’s souls? What did she do with that? More to the point, what did he do with it?
He didn’t need anyone to tell him the answer to that one. It would be professional suicide to get involved with a woman who was part of an active investigation, whether she was perpetrator, victim or innocent witness. So the only thing he could do was to shut down his feelings.
Too bad he wasn’t better at that. He ought to take an example from his big brother. As far as he could see, Jackson had been shutting down his feelings for most of his life. He closed the file on Jade and opened the much more cursory report on Edie Summers, mother of the twins. Just as he was telling himself that there was no earthly reason to waste time looking that far back in their lives, he saw one.
