by Gayle Roper
“You put that floor back,” he ordered.
Harl had expected this reaction. “Can’t. I burned it.”
Blind with rage, Pop swung.
The old man had been using the same move for years, and Harl dodged it with ease. He grabbed his father by the shirt front.
“Swing at me again,” Harl said in a low, tight voice, “and I’ll hit back.”
Pop’s face turned red and his teeth drew back in a snarl, but he didn’t strike out again. Instead he left the house and didn’t return that night.
The next day when Harl came home from school, a piece of plywood was nailed over the grate. Since Pop had already left for the taproom, Harl ripped it free, chopped it up, and fed it to the wood stove, stoking the fire hotter and hotter.
Pop came home late and, groggy with drink, had fallen asleep. There would never be a better time.
Harl fed the fire until it was a small inferno. He stepped back, leaving the door of the stove open as someone might if they wanted extra heat, watching, waiting. One coal leaped out, then two, then more and more, all pulsing a fierce red and fiery gold, sizzling, smoldering on the wood floor. When the floor exploded in flames, he smiled. He took his father’s bank card and all the money the old man had in his wallet. He then stood in the frigid air and watched the house and Pop go up in the crackling, soaring flames, for once not feeling the bite of the cold due to the warm satisfaction flooding him at the success of his vengeance.
When he was certain nothing would save the old place or the old man, he drove Pop’s car to the nearest ATM and took out as much money as possible. He tossed the card in a nearby Dumpster so he wouldn’t be tempted to use it again and give the police something to trace. He headed south, toward warmth even in January, and never looked back.
He smiled now as he watched the bay. He liked this little town. It wasn’t as warm as southern Arizona, but he did like the wildness of the oceans’ waves and the peace of the bay’s calm, neither a feature that Arizona could offer.
He looked over his shoulder. Mike was fussing with one of his fishing reels. What was it with the man and fishing? Harl didn’t see the attraction. He also didn’t understand why a man who liked deep-sea fishing would settle in Arizona.
In the background the television droned on about the discovery of the body of the missing local guy in the bay. Not that such a grizzly find dimmed the scene’s beauty in Harl’s eyes. Nothing could do that. Nor did the retrieval of the body concern Harl. In fact he felt quite complacent. As far as anyone knew, he was at the compound keeping silence with Mike at the retreat house as they sought God’s leading for The Pathway.
Right.
Retreating to pray was Mike’s customary cover for his fishing trips. It wouldn’t do for his followers who lived in austerity to know of his excursions aboard rented luxury yachts. Oh, they weren’t big yachts, just small, well-appointed ones. Mike didn’t want to draw unnecessary attention when he anchored in some marina.
Nor would it do for his followers to know what some of their donations were funding—and fishing trips were the least of it. Harl grinned what he liked to think of as his shark’s grin.
Was there time to sneak away for a walk on the beach, another feature Arizona lacked? But then Seaside didn’t have looming saguaro cacti, arms outstretched, thorns ready to impale you.
He thought for a moment about how different the two locales were, then smiled as he thought of the one feature they shared. Gullible people.
15
As I stumbled down the back steps in the early Tuesday morning light, bleary eyed from tossing and turning all night, I was still wrapped in sadness. In my head that little whisper reverberated louder than a rock band at full throttle.
“Ginny.”
Greg had sat at my kitchen table and whispered his dead wife’s name. I could stick bamboo shoots under my fingernails and experience less pain, less despair.
Even when Lindsay and I had been faced with living on the street, I’d had hope. We had escaped our own personal hell, were free, on our own, safe. Nothing we’d find in the wide world could compare to the dangers in our home.
We left all that evil for a better life. By God’s grace we found it. And I wasn’t ungrateful. Truly I wasn’t. Still my heart wept as I went in the café’s back door, my hopelessness jabbing, stabbing as I swallowed the tears burning in the back of my throat. Blessings in one area of life didn’t prevent sorrow in another.
I felt as if I had been robbed of my deepest hope, a foolish hope perhaps, an unrequited dream, but a hope nevertheless. And one word had done it.
“Ginny.”
I couldn’t imagine being loved like that, three years gone and still my name on someone’s lips. Oh, Lord, I wailed silently as I poured coffee and served Ricky’s food and Lindsay’s baked goods. Why not me?
I must have sighed because a gnarled hand reached over the pink marble counter and patted mine.
“It’ll be okay, Carrie. Whatever it is, it’ll get better.”
I looked into Mr. Perkins’s kind, concerned face and wanted to lay my head on his bony shoulder and weep. “I’m okay.” I forced a smile.
He touched under his eye, and I lifted my free hand to my eye.
“Just had a bad night,” I said, unhappy that it showed so clearly in the dark circles I’d tried to disguise with eraser stick.
He nodded. “All that excitement yesterday.”
“Yesterday was wild.” I forced another smile.
The door opened and Greg came in, so handsome in spite of being bruised and scabby. The hematoma from the bump on his forehead had settled into a lovely black eye, which should have made him look disreputable but didn’t. My heart did its usual Snoopy dance, apparently unaware of the hopelessness of the situation, something my mind grasped with great sorrow. Clearly I needed better communication between body parts.
Mr. Perkins patted my hand harder. I looked at him with something like panic. He knew?
My face burned. It was a sad day when one’s deepest secret was known to all, because if Mr. Perkins figured it out, how many others had also guessed? Ricky? Clooney? I already knew Lindsay, Mary P, and Andi suspected. Could life get any worse?
I pulled free and reached for the decaf coffee before I thought. I almost poured it over Mr. Perkins’s hand as he covered his cup protectively.
“Carrie!” He looked at me, appalled. “The real thing!”
I gave him a weak smile. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. We’ve got to keep your blood pumping.”
I filled his cup with my special blend, knowing I’d have to say something to Greg and sure that everyone was listening.
“Hi,” Greg said with a warm smile. I felt I should look behind me to see who he was smiling at. If he wasn’t careful, I’d think he was glad to see me.
“Hi.” Courtesy of a brain freeze, I couldn’t think of anything else to say. I grabbed an empty cup.
He slid onto his stool, his smile gone as quickly as it had bloomed. He was barely settled before I handed him his coffee. He nodded his thanks.
“The usual?” I managed. Good. Two words. My brain must be thawing.
He nodded again.
“Got it,” Lindsay called. “Ricky, the usual for Greg.”
“Did you hear what the president just did?” Indignation poured off Mr. Perkins. He gave me a quick little sympathetic smile that made me cringe, then went back to being indignant. In all the years he’d been coming in, I don’t think there’d been a president he liked. Today, though, I couldn’t be certain whether he wanted to dump his take on the latest political goings-on on a new audience or whether he was trying to make things easier for me by claiming Greg’s attention. The latter thought made me teary with affection for the frustrating old man. I looked away and blinked until I knew I wasn’t going to humiliate myself.
Greg held up a finger, a signal to Mr. Perkins to be quiet. He took a deep breath, then exhaled. He looked at me. “They found Jase Pe
oples.”
My hand went to my heart as if to protect it from more pain. “It’s bad, isn’t it?”
He nodded.
“Where?” I asked, my stomach twisting.
“Floating in the bay.”
“No!” Tears came now, and I made no effort to staunch them. I pictured Jase in the kitchen, steam rising around him as he worked, a smile on his lips as he responded to something Ricky had said.
“Jase is dead?” Andi stood wide-eyed by Mr. Perkins. “That can’t be! How do you know? Maybe you have it wrong.”
I slipped my arm around her as Greg said, “I wish I did.”
“Greg’s got connections.” I stroked her hair. “If he says, then it’s so.”
I felt her shaking, and her breathing was ragged. I felt pretty fragile myself.
“He was my friend,” she whispered. “He was my friend.”
We were all quiet, even Mr. Perkins.
Andi pulled back. “I’ve got to call Clooney.” She bolted for the kitchen.
Lindsay appeared at the pass-through. “Is Andi right? Is Jase dead?”
Greg and I nodded.
She squeezed her eyes shut and gave a great sigh. “I liked him a lot. He was a nice guy in a world where they are in short supply.” She turned and went back into the kitchen.
“Such a waste.” My voice caught, and I had to clear my throat before I could continue. “Do they know what happened?”
Greg’s expression hardened. “Whatever it was, it wasn’t an accident.”
“Murder?” The word felt foreign on my lips. Murder was for mystery novels and television shows, not for people you knew.
Greg’s silence told me all I needed to know. I glanced toward the kitchen and Andi. “How long ago?”
“I’d guess Saturday night, but that’s just a guess. The coroner will determine time of death.”
I mopped my tears and sighed. “No wonder the tweeters couldn’t find him.”
Lindsay reappeared in the pass-through. “Where in the bay?”
“About midway between the causeway and the Thirty-Fourth Street Bridge,” Greg said. “He was caught in the marshy grasses at Turtle Island.”
“Don’t you wonder why, Greg?” Lindsay walked into the café proper, carrying his scrambled eggs and toast. “Doesn’t something like this get your cop juices going? Don’t you want to find out who did this terrible thing?”
“Oh, yeah. I wonder who and why and how.” He studied his plate, made a face, and poked at his eggs with his fork.
“Not hungry?” I could understand that. Tragic news dampened the appetite.
“It’s not that.” He poked at the eggs some more.
I studied the eggs. They looked fine to me, light and fluffy. I might not know much about Ricky as a person except that he was allergic to cats and yearned after Lindsay, but one thing I did know: he was a good cook.
“They’re fine. Fine,” Greg said with a definite lack of enthusiasm. As if to prove his comment true, he took one bite and then another. “Good.”
I glanced at Lindsay just as she looked at me. Somehow neither of us was convinced, especially when he took a great swig of coffee after every bite.
The café door opened, and Jem Barnes entered. Greg looked at his father in surprise.
“I wasn’t expecting you today, was I, Dad?”
“I don’t know.” Jem slipped onto a stool. “Were you?”
I liked Greg’s father. He was a tall, slim man with a snow white mustache even though his hair was still mostly brown. He had an engaging smile, the kind that made you smile back no matter how blue you were feeling. If Greg looked like him thirty years from now, he’d be a handsome man.
“I’ll have one of Lindsay’s sticky buns,” Jem said. “There is still one left, isn’t there?”
I slid open the back of the display case and selected one for him.
“Did we have plans?” Greg asked his father.
Jem shook his head. “Not that I know of.”
Greg frowned. “Then why are you here?”
Interesting question since Jem lived a good twenty miles inland, too far to just drop in. Was he here to check up on Greg? He’d done that many times after Ginny and the kids died, back when Greg was drinking too much.
But Greg was doing very well now. I studied him as I filled Jem’s cup. His eyes were clear and his color good, bruises notwithstanding, visible proof that he’d been sober for a long time. I knew because I kept a running calendar in my head.
Not that he’d been alcohol dependent, not in the sense of being an alcoholic. He’d used drink to dull his pain, to make life bearable when the emotional agony was overwhelming.
Back then I would work the counter when Jem and Greg sat together, and I’d hear Jem trying to reach his son.
“You can’t use alcohol as a soporific to put yourself to sleep.” The pain in Jem’s voice as he watched his son hurt was clear, and the look on Jem’s face brought tears to my eyes.
Greg always nodded, but if his reddened eyes when he came in the next time were any indication, he ignored the advice.
“Son, drinking won’t solve your problems. It’ll just create new ones.”
“Don’t you think I know that?” That day Greg lost his temper. “I’ve seen what it does more times than I can count. I’m a cop, remember?”
There was a sharp silence as Jem stared into his cup and Greg looked bereft.
“At least I was a cop.” He slid off his stool and all but ran out the door.
Jem had sighed, overtipped me, and left, shoulders rounded with sorrow.
Then one Saturday about a year after Ginny and the kids died, Greg’s brothers stepped in, all five of them, including the one who was a missionary in Mexico. I know because they cornered him here at the café.
“Just what I need.” Greg eyed them in disgust. “What? You didn’t bring Mom and Dad too?”
“Like we want them to hear us reaming you out,” one brother said. “What we have to say isn’t for their ears.”
“Go away, all of you.” Greg glowered at them. “I mean it.”
“We’re going,” said another, “but you’re coming with us whether you like it or not.”
“Five against one? I can take you all.”
“At the moment you’re such a sorry excuse for a man, you couldn’t take any of us.” It was the missionary from Mexico.
They all had that don’t-mess-with-us look, and it was clear they’d take him by force if they needed to. The odds were in their favor in spite of Greg’s background a Marine and a cop.
They bore him off for what must have been a humdinger of a conversation. Greg hadn’t touched a drop since. Life had slowly, slowly seeped back into him, and I thought he was doing well.
Now Jem studied him. “Which one of your tenants popped you?”
Greg lifted a gentle hand to his shiner. “You didn’t read about it on Twitter?”
“I don’t tweet. My life isn’t worth the minute examination it requires.”
“There was this guy named Chaz,” Mr. Perkins began and gave his version of the incident. Since he wasn’t there, it was a bit skewed but by and large accurate.
Jem looked impressed. “Anything else going on around here I should know about, Mr. Perkins?”
Mr. Perkins launched into the tale of Jase.
“I heard about the murder on the news as I was driving here,” Jem said. “I didn’t realize there was a Carrie’s connection.”
“It makes me so sad!” My throat went tight, and I had to swallow.
Everyone nodded agreement. Then Mr. Perkins waved his spoon, dripping coffee on the counter. “The big question is what happened to him between when Bill decked him and he floated to the top. And a second biggie—did Bill do it?”
“Mr. Perkins! What an awful thing to say!” Andi glared at him as she came to the counter. “Bill would never do something so terrible.”
“He already did something terrible,” Mr. Perkins, ever the di
plomat, was quick to point out. “He knocked Jase unconscious.”
Andi made a brushing-away gesture. “That wasn’t anything. He thought he was protecting me. He’s just too nice to do something really mean.”
Just moderately mean. I sighed. She was ignoring the still-purple skin about her wrist.
“Besides he was with me,” she said. “How could he hurt Jase if he was with me?”
Greg studied her. “He was with you all night?”
She squirmed. “Well, no. Clooney makes me come home by midnight on weekends. I keep telling him how lame that is, but he’s like a rock that can’t be moved.” She made a disgusted noise.
“You’re lucky to have someone who cares.” I couldn’t resist saying it. When I was her age, I was already on my own with a ten-year-old to care for, scared to death but determined. I’d have loved a caring family, even one as removed as a great-uncle.
“Remember how Jase had come home very recently after being gone for several years?” Greg said. “My sources tell me he’d been in The Pathway.”
If he was trying to divert the attention from Andi, he failed. She sucked in a breath and blurted, “They know Jase was in The Pathway?”
“The Pathway?” Lindsay looked appalled as she brought a platter of freshly baked, saucer-sized sugar cookies for the display case. “Michael the Archangel?”
“They’re all nuts,” Mr. Perkins said.
“Maybe.” Greg pushed away the plate with the largely uneaten eggs he tried to hide beneath his napkin. “For sure they’re different. I’ll have one of those cookies.”
Lindsay slid one onto a plate for him.
“How old was he?” Mr. Perkins asked. “He looked about ten.”
I assumed he meant Jase, not Michael.
“Twenty-five, according to the paper,” Greg said. “He took off at eighteen, was gone for seven years, and was with The Pathway for most of those years.”
“That group’s a cult, if you want my opinion,” Mr. Perkins said.
This time I tended to agree with him. Everything I’d read about The Pathway sounded bogus, from the claims of their leader, Michael the Archangel, to their reclusive, secretive, “God-ordained” way of life in their isolated desert compound.
