He lit another cigarette. “I found Kenny a few yards back. He’d been gut-shot, almost split in two. After I finished puking my guts out, I left him there. I didn’t want to, but I had to if I wanted to save my worthless ass. The guy had stopped shooting. He must have thought there were only two of us. I was up to my ass in mud when I reached this clump of cypress, and I really thought I’d made it. I scrambled to my feet, and there he was, standing not five feet away, looking as surprised as I was.
“He was just a kid. Eleven, twelve years old. I looked at him and he looked at me, and for the first time, it dawned on me that this wasn’t just some gook, this wasn’t just the enemy, this was a real human being like me. Somebody’s kid. And he must have felt the same way, because we just stood there, two human beings frozen in hell, and looked at each other.”
He was silent for so long that Casey thought he’d forgotten she was in the room. He filled his lungs with smoke, then abruptly crushed out his cigarette. “And then,” he said, “I killed him.”
***
They headed north out of the District of Columbia the next morning beneath overcast skies. The forecast was dismal: a low pressure system was working its way in from the Midwest, bringing with it rain and sleet and record snowfalls. It had already dumped more than a foot of snow on western Pennsylvania, and it was headed in a meandering northeasterly direction. “A little over 200 miles from DC to New York,” Danny said, pressing harder on the accelerator. “From there, we can outrun it.”
Casey tightened her seat belt and stared out the windshield at the driving rain they’d encountered just north of Baltimore. It was coming down in torrents, bouncing off the surface of the roadway, awash with reflected light, destroying visibility. “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather spend the night somewhere?” she said.
“In some run-down motel room,” he said, “with a rock-hard bed? No, thank you. I’ve spent too many nights in places like that. Tonight, I’m sleeping in my own house, in my own bed.” He glanced at her tense face, and his voice softened. “Don’t worry, carissima. I’ll get you there in one piece.”
It had been a long time since he’d called her that, and Casey took his hand and threaded fingers with his. “I’m not worried,” she said. “I’ll just be relieved when we get home.”
They ran into the first flakes of snow halfway through Jersey. Danny slowed his speed, but he kept glancing at the dashboard clock and frowning. “Christ,” he said in disgust. “Why the hell didn’t we buy a house in Palm Beach?”
It was nearly three o’clock when they stopped at a rest area near Newark. While they waited for their meal, Casey sipped coffee and Danny glumly watched the sooty snow outside the restaurant window. “Look at that fool,” he said as a beat-up Toyota pulled in a little too fast, fishtailed, and nearly cleaned out the left rear fender of a white Caddy. “It’s people like that who make the roads dangerous for the rest of us.”
The waitress brought them each a bowl of soup and a sandwich. “You know,” Casey said, crumbling oyster crackers into her bowl, “we could just stay in New York tonight.”
“And then we won’t get home until tomorrow afternoon.” He picked up a dinner roll and plucked a packet of butter from the dish in the center of the table. Peeling off the foil, he said, “I thought you weren’t worried.”
“I wasn’t worried then. I am now.”
“Let’s just see how it goes. If it’s really bad, we’ll stop somewhere in Connecticut.”
It was as good as she was going to get. They finished the meal in silence. By the time they went back out into the storm, the wind had started up, and the snow was blowing in a blinding cloud. They made a run for the BMW, slamming doors against the onslaught. Danny pulled the car out of its parking slot and shifted it into gear. “You’re not wearing your seat belt,” she said. “And please don’t remind me of your ‘live hard and fast’ philosophy. I’m not in the mood.”
Danny cleared his throat. “What I was about to say, before I was so rudely interrupted, was that I’d forgotten. I don’t suppose you’d care to fasten it for me?”
She leaned over, reached around him, tugged the belt, snapped it into place. Adjusted the harness until it fit him snugly. “I’m sorry,” she said. “This weather’s turned me into a basket case.”
It took them two hours to get through New York. Bumper-to-bumper traffic moved like a caravan of snails, stopping and starting, splashing and sliding, a sea of tail lights that ebbed and flowed into the night. They sat for a half-hour on the Cross-Bronx Expressway while a wrecker peeled a mangled Ford Granada off the guardrail and towed it away. By the time they reached New Haven, she’d counted seventeen cars off the road, one of them a rollover. “Danny,” she said, “I’ve had enough. I want to stop now.”
He glanced at the dashboard clock. “Let’s put thirty more miles behind us, and we’ll stop. All right?”
Thirty miles loomed like a hundred, but she reluctantly agreed. “Fine,” she said. “Thirty more miles, and then we stop at the first motel we see.”
“If I’d had any idea it would be like this,” he said, “I would have stayed in DC. I really thought we could beat this mess home.”
The car lost traction and skidded for a moment, and Casey’s heart jumped into her throat. But he quickly brought it back under control, and the adrenaline in her bloodstream slowly receded to a normal level. “Damn it, Danny,” she said, “if you kill us, I swear to God I’ll never speak to you again.”
Gripping the wheel tightly, he said, “I’m not going to kill us.”
An eighteen-wheeler sped by them in the passing lane, splattering the windshield with a heavy coating of muddy slush. “Christless idiot,” Danny said. “Thinks he’s running the Indy 500.”
The snow was coming down almost sideways, and they were driving directly into it. He switched his headlights to low beam in a futile attempt to see through the blinding mass. The beam reflected off a road sign advertising food, fuel and accommodations at the next exit. “I guess we’d better stop,” he said reluctantly. “How far did it say?”
“Six miles,” Casey said, breathing a sigh of relief.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I had no idea it would be this bad. I just didn’t want to spend all day tomorrow on the road.”
“I don’t understand,” she said. “What’s your hurry? You’re not on any deadline. You don’t have any commitments. What difference does it make if we spend an extra day or two on the road?”
His knuckles were white on the steering wheel. “I guess I haven’t learned to slow down yet.”
“If you don’t,” she said grimly, “you’ll die of a coronary before you’re fifty.”
“I don’t think so,” he said. “I’ve changed my mind. I’m not going to crash and burn. I’m going to be right there beside you in your dotage.”
For some reason, his words wrought in her an inexplicable sadness. “What about children? What about grandchildren? It’s too late for us to start over.”
“We’ll borrow somebody else’s. If Rob would ever settle down, we could use his.” The wipers swished across the windshield, and ahead of them, a sign said Next Exit 2 Miles. “I hope to Christ there’s a restaurant around with a well-stocked bar,” he said, “because when I get out of this car, I’m going to want to drink my dinner.”
“That makes two of us,” she said.
Ahead of them, brake lights flashed, then disappeared. Danny sighed. “Now what?” he said.
“I don’t know, but I’d suggest slowing down.”
“I’m only doing forty-seven.”
“That’s too fast for these conditions.”
“Look,” he said, “if you’d like to drive—” He squinted, leaning over the wheel, and then, in an odd voice, he said, “Christ Almighty.”
Casey looked up in alarm. Directly in front of them, blocking the highway, lay the eighteen-wheeler that had passed them earlier, toppled like a turtle, its wheels still spinning in mid-air. She grabbed the dash
in terror. “Danny,” she said.
“Hang on,” he said, pumping the brakes like crazy. The car went into a skid and began spinning, slowly at first and then gaining momentum. “Goddamn it,” he growled, cramming the shifter into low gear.
At the last possible moment, the wheels caught and they missed the truck. They plowed head-first into the snow bank, sliced through it and came out the other side. We’re all right, she thought. We made it. Then she saw the embankment dropping away in front of them, and she screamed his name. They pitched forward into empty space, and then they were falling, tumbling end over end in the blackness, small objects catapulting like missiles around them as they tumbled and rolled, tumbled and rolled. She reached out for Danny, but she couldn’t find him. The car slammed up against a solid object and the windshield burst in her face, and then something struck her in the temple with enough force to snap her head back against the headrest.
And the world went black.
BOOK FOUR
chapter twenty-seven
December, 1987
Midland, Connecticut
Dawn was just beginning to lighten the eastern sky when Rob MacKenzie fishtailed his dad’s LTD into the parking lot at Midland Hospital. It had taken him four hours of white-knuckle driving to get from Boston to this rinky-dink establishment in this rinky-dink little town. Above the front entrance, Season’s Greetings was spelled out in plastic holly leaves. Somewhere inside, Casey was waiting for him. Somehow, he had to do this. Somehow, he had to walk into that building and be strong for her when inside he was falling apart.
It had been a rough trip, and not just because he was driving through a blizzard in a rear-wheel-drive gunboat that was as useful in the snow as a surfboard. He had spent most of the four-hour trip trying to make sense of this madness. Danny Fiore wasn’t an ordinary man, he was a god. Gods weren’t supposed to die. And Rob MacKenzie, a mere mortal, wondered how he would make it through this nightmare without breaking down.
At the main desk, he asked for Father Letourneau. A few minutes later, a white-haired man in a cable knit sweater and a clerical collar greeted him with outstretched hand. “Mr. MacKenzie,” he said.
“Father.”
The priest held Rob’s hand in a strong grip and studied his face. “You and Mr. Fiore were close,” he said.
Rob swallowed. “Yeah,” he said. “We are. Were.”
“I’m sorry.” The priest shook his head. “I deal with death every day. It’s my job. But sometimes, it really gets to me. This is one of those times.”
He cleared his throat. “How is she?”
“As well as can be expected. She’s a brave young woman, but the enormity of this hasn’t hit her yet. Right now she’s quiet and compliant. Some of that’s due to the sedation she was given. The rest is nature’s anesthesia. Sometimes, when something unbearable happens, nature takes over for a while and we go someplace where the pain can’t follow us.”
He raked a hand through his tangled hair. “I don’t know what to do,” he said. “How to help her.”
“Allow her to set the pace. Be there for her. Does she have a reliable support system?”
“Lots of family nearby. And me. I’ll stay as long as she needs me.”
“Good. If she wants to talk, listen. If she doesn’t want to, don’t push it. If she wants to be alone, respect her wishes, within reason. Try to keep life as normal as possible. But don’t expect too much from her at first. She’s been through a terrible ordeal. She took quite a bump to the head, then she kicked out a window and went through it, slicing herself up quite prettily in the process. She was in shock when they brought her in.”
Rob closed his eyes. “Jesus,” he said.
“She’ll need time to recover, physically and emotionally.” The priest laid a hand on his shoulder. “What about you?” he said. “How’s your support system?”
“Don’t worry about me.”
“It’s my job to worry about you. The doctors here take care of the sick and the dying. I take care of the people who love them.”
“Thanks, Father, but I’ll deal with it my own way, in my own time.” His throat clogged up, and he closed his eyes against the sting of tears. “I’m sorry,” he said, embarrassed. “I thought I got all my crying out of the way on the trip from Boston.”
“It’s all right, son. Take a few minutes to pull yourself together.”
He drew a long, shuddering breath. “I have to get her out of here before the media gets wind of this.”
Father Letourneau nodded somberly. “The hospital hasn’t released the name of the deceased yet, but most of the staff knows, and in a small town like this, news spreads like wildfire.”
“Has anybody called her father? I don’t want her family hearing about it on the radio.”
“No. I had enough trouble prying your name out of her. Is there someone you’d like me to call? Mr. Fiore’s family, perhaps?”
“Casey and I are the only family Danny has. Had.” He hesitated, more rattled than he’d realized. “I’m sorry,” he said, rubbing his temple. “I’m not thinking straight.”
“It’s all right. Take your time.”
“I guess I can call her folks from the road.” He closed his eyes. “Shit,” he whispered. “I can’t believe this.”
He followed the priest down a maze of corridors, stopping at the door of a small sitting room. Casey was curled in a fetal position on the couch, feet tucked under her, Danny’s suede jacket wrapped around her, twelve sizes too big. She was staring blankly at the television, where Lucy and Ethel were up to their usual shenanigans. On the table beside her there was an untouched cup of coffee. In her hand, a wrinkled manila envelope. “Hey,” he said softly.
She looked up. There was a bandage over her left eyebrow, and her cheek was peppered with tiny red welts where they’d pulled microscopic glass fragments from tender flesh. There was blood in her hair and all over her clothes, and she had a black eye. She looked like something from Night of the Living Dead, and he tried to keep the shock from his face as he entered the room and knelt on the floor in front of her. He wanted desperately to touch her, but didn’t dare. Instead, he touched the manila envelope, gingerly, with a single fingertip. “What’s in here, sweetheart?”
She let him take it from her, and he opened the flap. Inside were Danny’s wallet, his wedding ring, his Rolex. Rob swallowed hard and closed the envelope and gave it back to her, dreadfully sorry he’d asked. He looked to the priest for help, but at some point, Father Letourneau had discreetly left the room. He was on his own.
He cleared his throat. “Did they give you any medication?”
She reached into the pocket of Danny’s bloodstained jacket and pulled out a vial of pills and two prescription slips. Valium and Tylenol with codeine. He tucked them back into her pocket. “Are you in a lot of pain?” he asked.
She looked at him, but she wasn’t seeing him. “I can’t feel anything,” she said. “Why can’t I feel anything?”
“It’s a temporary condition,” he said. “Come on, sweetheart, let’s go home.”
The priest stood in the vestibule and watched them, all the way to the car. The storm was over, the roads cleared, the sun breaking through. Casey burrowed into the seat cushion and Rob drove like a little old lady so he wouldn’t frighten her. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched her open the envelope. She took out Danny’s Rolex and slipped it on her arm, shoving it all the way to her elbow before it stayed put. And they rode in silence.
He drove about twenty miles before pulling into the parking lot of a rural diner. Casey looked at him blankly. “Breakfast,” he said, releasing his seat belt. “If my blood sugar gets any lower, I’ll be comatose.”
The table was sticky, the menus greasy. The waitress looked at Casey oddly but didn’t comment on her appearance. He ordered bacon and eggs, home fries and toast. Casey stared helplessly at the menu. “She’ll have the same thing I’m having,” he said, and took the menu from her hands and closed i
t.
The coffee tasted like mud. He loaded it with sugar and drank it to lessen his shakiness. When the food arrived, he dug in, ravenous, but Casey just looked at her plate. “I can’t do this,” she said woodenly.
“Yes, you can.”
“No.” She shook her head and looked at him with absolute certainty. “I can’t.”
He set down his fork and took her hand. “You’re strong, babe. You’re the strongest person I know. You can do this. You’ll get through this.”
She looked up at him. “How?”
“You pick up your fork and take a bite. You chew it and swallow it. Then you do it again.”
That blank gaze never wavered. “I wasn’t talking about eating,” she said.
“Neither was I. You have to take life in little bites. If thirty seconds at a time is all you can handle right now, that’s how you live life. Thirty seconds at a time, until you’re ready to handle more. Then you take it ten minutes at a time, and then a half hour. Nobody’s going to ask you to make decisions. Nobody’s going to ask you to think. Nobody’s going to ask you to do anything you don’t feel ready to do. I’ll be there to see that they don’t.”
She set down her fork. “I need to use the bathroom.”
“Go ahead,” he said, then remembered the pills in her pocket. “But leave the jacket here.”
He didn’t like the idea of her going alone, but there were some places even he couldn’t follow her. While she was in the rest room, he used the pay phone to call her folks and tell them in as few words as possible what had happened. When he returned to the table she was still gone, and he stewed until the door to the bathroom opened and she emerged. He didn’t think she was suicidal, but he wasn’t about to leave her alone long enough to find out.
Coming Home (Jackson Falls Series) Page 33
