River's End

by Nora Roberts

  “I bet you do. Do you know what time you went to bed?”

  “I’m ’posed to go to bed at eight o’clock. Chickens go broody at eight. Mama told me the story about the lady with long, long hair who lived in the tower.”

  “Later you woke up. Were you thirsty?”

  “No.” She lifted her thumb to her mouth again. “I had a bad dream.”

  “My Noah has bad dreams, too. When he tells me about them, he feels better.”

  “Is Noah your little boy? How old is he?”

  “He’s ten now. Do you want to see his picture?”

  “Uh-huh.” She scooted closer as Frank took out his wallet and flipped through. Cocking her head, she studied the school photo of a boy with untidy brown hair and a wide grin. “He’s pretty. Maybe he can come over to play.”

  “Maybe. Sometimes he has bad dreams about space aliens.”

  Forgive me, Noah, Frank thought with some amusement as he replaced his wallet, for sharing your darkest secret. “When he tells me about them, he feels better. You want to tell me about your bad dream?”

  “People are yelling. I don’t like when Mama and Daddy fight. He’s sick and he has to get well, and we have to keep wishing really, really hard for him to get all better so he can come home.”

  “In your dream you heard your mother and father yelling?”

  “People are yelling, but I can’t hear what they say. I don’t want to. I want them to stop. I want my mama to come. Somebody screams, like in the movies that Rosa watches. They scream and scream, and I wake up. I don’t hear anything, ’cause it was just a dream. I want Mama.”

  “Did you go to find her?”

  “She wasn’t in bed. I wanted to get in bed with her. She doesn’t mind. Then I . . .”

  She broke off and gave a great deal of attention to her puzzle.

  “It’s all right, Livvy. You can tell me what happened next.”

  “I’m not supposed to touch the magic bottles. I didn’t break any.”

  “Where are the magic bottles?”

  “On Mama’s little table with the mirror. I can have some when I get bigger, but they’re toys for big girls. I just played with them for a minute.”

  She sent Frank such an earnest look, he had to smile. “That’s all right then. What did you do next?”

  “I went downstairs. The lights were on, and the door was open. It was warm outside. Maybe somebody came to see us, maybe we can have cake.” Tears began to stream down her cheeks. “I don’t want to say now.”

  “It’s okay, Livvy. You can tell me. It’s okay to tell me.”

  And it was. She could look into his green eyes and it was all right to say. “It smells bad, and things are broken, and they’re red and wet and nasty. The flowers are on the floor and there’s glass. You don’t walk near glass in your bare feet ’cause it hurts. I don’t want to step in it. I see Mama, and she’s lying down on the floor, and the red and the wet is all over her. The monster’s with her. He has her scissors in his hand.”

  She held up her own, fingers curled tight and a glazed look in her eye. “ ‘Livvy. God, Livvy,’ ” she said in a horrible mimic of her father’s voice. “I ran away, and he kept calling. He was breaking things and looking for me and crying. I hid in the closet.” Another tear trembled and fell. “I wet my pants.”

  “That’s all right, honey. That doesn’t matter.”

  “Big girls don’t.”

  “You’re a very big girl. And very brave and smart.” When she gave him a watery smile, he prayed he wouldn’t have to put her through that night again.

  He drew her attention back to her puzzle, made some foolish comment about talking pumpkins that had her giggling. He didn’t want her parting thought of him to be of fear and blood and madness.

  Still, when he turned at the door to glance back, Olivia’s eyes were on him, quietly pleading, and holding that terrifyingly adult expression only the very young can manage.

  As he started downstairs, he found his thoughts running with Jamie Melbourne’s. He wanted Sam Tanner’s blood.

  “You were very good with her.” Jamie’s control had almost reached the end of its strength. She wanted to curl up and weep as her mother was. To mire herself in chores and duties as her husband was. Anything, anything but reliving this over again as she had through Olivia’s words.

  “She’s a remarkable girl.”

  “Takes after her mother.”

  He stopped then, turned and looked at Jamie squarely. “I’d say she’s got some of her aunt in her.”

  There was a flicker of surprise over her face, then a sigh. “She had nightmares last night, and I’ll catch her just staring off into space with that—that vacant look in her eyes. Sucking her thumb. She stopped sucking her thumb before she was a year old.”

  “Whatever comforts. Mrs. Melbourne, you’ve got a lot on your mind, and a lot more to deal with. You’re going to want to think about counseling, not just for Olivia, but for all of you.”

  “Yes, I’ll think about it. Right now, I just have to get through the moment. I want to see Sam.”

  “That’s not a good idea.”

  “I want to see the man who murdered my sister. I want to look him in the eye. That’s my therapy, Detective Brady.”

  “I’ll see what I can do. I appreciate your time and cooperation. And again, we’re sorry for your loss.”

  “See that he pays.” She opened the door, braced herself against the calls and shouts of the press, of the curious, crowded in the street.

  “We’ll be in touch” was all Frank said.

  Jamie closed the door, leaned heavily against it. She lost track of how long she stood there, eyes closed, head bent, but she jerked straight when a hand fell on her shoulder.

  “Jamie, you need some rest.” David turned her into his arms. “I want you to take a pill and lie down.”

  “No, no pills. I’m not having my mind or my feelings clouded.” But she laid her head on his shoulder and some of the pressure eased out of her chest. “The two detectives were just here.”

  “You should have called me.”

  “They wanted to talk to me, and to Livvy.”

  “Livvy?” He pulled her back to stare at her. “For God’s sake, Jamie, you didn’t let them interrogate that child?”

  “It wasn’t like that, David.” Resentment wanted to surface, but she was too tired for it. “Detective Brady was very gentle with her, and I stayed the whole time. They needed to know what she’d seen. She’s the only witness.”

  “The hell with that. They have him cold. He was there, he had the weapon. He was fucking stoned as he’s been half the time the last year.”

  At Jamie’s quick warning look toward the stairs, he sucked in a breath, let it out slowly. Calm, he reminded himself. They all had to stay calm to get through this. “They have all the evidence they need to put him away for the rest of his miserable life,” he finished.

  “Now they have Livvy’s statement that she saw him, she heard him.” She lifted a hand to her head. “I don’t know how it works, I don’t know what happens next. I can’t think about it.”

  “I’m sorry.” He gathered her close again. “I just don’t want you or Livvy, or any of us, to suffer more than we have to. I want you to call me before you let them talk to her again. I think we need to consult a child psychologist to make sure it isn’t damaging to her.”

  “Maybe you’re right. She likes Detective Brady, though. You can tell she feels safe with him. I upset my mother.” For a moment, she burrowed against David’s throat. “I need to go up to her.”

  “All right. Jamie.” He slid his hands down her arms, linked fingers with her. “They’re going to release Julie’s body day after tomorrow. We can hold the memorial service the following day, if you’re ready for it. I’ve started making the arrangements.”

  “Oh, David.” Pathetically grateful, she shuddered back a sob. “You didn’t have to do that. I was going to make calls later today.”

 
; “I know what you want for her. Let me take care of this for all of us, Jamie. I loved her, too.” He brought her hands to his lips, pressed a kiss to her fingers.

  “I know.”

  “I have to do something. Details are what I do best. I, ah, I’ve been working on a press release. There has to be one.” He ran his hands up her arms again, back down in a gesture of comfort. “It’s more your area than mine, but I figured simple was best. I’ll run it by you before it’s confirmed. But as for the rest . . . just let me take care of it.”

  “I don’t know what I’d do without you, David. I don’t know what I’d do.”

  “You’ll never have to find out.” He kissed her, softly. “Go up to your mother, and promise me you’ll try to get some rest.”

  “Yes, I will.”

  He waited until she walked upstairs, then went to the door, stared out the glass panels at the figures sweltering outside in the high summer heat.

  And thought of vultures over fresh kill.

  three

  She didn’t want to take a nap. She wasn’t sleepy. But Olivia tried, because Aunt Jamie had asked her to, and lay in the bed that wasn’t hers.

  It was a pretty room with little violets climbing up the walls and white curtains with tiny white dots on them that made everything soft and filmy when you looked through them. She always slept in this room when she came to visit.

  But it wasn’t home.

  She’d told Grandma she wanted to go home, that she could come, too. They could have a tea party in the garden until Mama got home.

  But Grandma’s eyes had gotten bright and wet, and she’d hugged Olivia so hard it almost hurt.

  So she hadn’t said anything more about going home.

  When she heard the murmur of voices down the hall, behind the door of the room where her grandparents were staying, Olivia climbed out of bed and tiptoed from the room. Aunt Jamie had said, when Olivia asked, that Grandma and Grandpop were taking naps, too. But if they were awake, maybe they could go out and play. Grandma and Grandpop liked to be outside best of all. They could play ball or go swimming or climb a tree.

  Grandpop said there were trees that reached right up and brushed the sky in Washington. Olivia had been there to visit when she was a tiny baby and again when she’d been two, so she couldn’t remember very well. She thought Grandpop could find a sky-brushing tree for her so she could climb all the way up and call her mother. Mama would hear if she could just get closer to heaven.

  When she opened the door, she saw her grandmother crying, her aunt sitting beside her holding her hands. It made her stomach hurt to see Grandma cry, and it made her afraid when she saw her grandpop’s face. It was so tight and his eyes were too dark and mean. His voice, when he spoke, was quiet but hard, as if he were trying to break the words instead of say them. It made Olivia cringe back to make herself small.

  “It doesn’t matter why he did it. He’s crazy, crazy with jealousy and drugs. What matters is he killed her, he took her away from us. He’ll pay for it, every day of his miserable life, he’ll pay. It’ll never be enough.”

  “We should’ve made her come home.” Tears continued to slide down Grandma’s cheeks. “When she told us she and Sam were having trouble, we should have told her to bring Livvy and come home for a while. To get her bearings.”

  “We didn’t know he’d gotten violent, didn’t know he’d hurt her.” Grandpa’s fists balled at his sides. “If I’d known, I’d have come down here and dealt with the son of a bitch myself.”

  “We can’t go back, Dad.” Jamie spoke wearily, for some of that responsibility was hers. She had known and said nothing. Julie had asked her to say nothing. “If we could, I know I’d be able to see a hundred different things I could do to change it, to stop it. But I can’t, and we have to face the now. The press—”

  “Fuck the press.”

  From her peep through the doorway, Olivia widened her eyes. Grandpop never said the bad word. She could only goggle as her aunt nodded calmly.

  “Well, Dad, before much longer they might look to fuck us. That’s the way of it. They’ll canonize Julie, or make her a whore. Or they’ll do both. We have to, for Livvy’s sake, take as much control as we can. There’ll be speculation and stories about her marriage and relationship with Sam—speculation about other men. Particularly Lucas Manning.”

  “Julie was not a cheat.” Grandma’s voice rose, snapped.

  “I know that, Mom. But that’s the kind of game that’s played.”

  “She’s dead,” Grandpop said flatly. “Julie’s dead. How much worse can it get?”

  Slowly, Olivia backed up from the door. She knew what dead meant. Flowers got dead when they were all brown and stiff and you had to throw them away. Tiffy’s old dog, Casey, had died and they’d dug a hole in the yard and put him inside, covered him up with dirt and grass.

  Dead meant you couldn’t come back.

  She kept moving away from the door while the breath got hot and thick in her chest, while flashes of blood and broken glass, of monsters and snapping scissors raced through her head.

  Then that breath burst out, burning over her heart as she started to run. And she started to scream.

  “Mama’s not dead. Mama’s not dead and in a hole in the yard. She’s coming back. She’s coming back soon.”

  She kept running, away from the shouts of her name, down the steps, down the hall. At the front door, she fought with the knob while tears flooded her cheeks. She had to get outside. She had to find a tree, a sky-brushing tree, so she could climb up and call Mama home.

  She fought it open and raced out. There were crowds of people, and she didn’t know where to go. Everyone was shouting, at once, like a big wave of sound crashing over her head, hurting her ears. She pressed her hands to them, crying, calling for her mother.

  A dozen cameras greedily captured the shot. Ate the moment and her grief and her fear.

  Someone shouted for them to leave her alone, she’s just a baby. But the reporters surged forward, caught in the frenzy. Sun shot off lenses, blinded her. She saw shadows and shapes, a blur of strange faces. Voices boomed out questions, commands.

  Look this way, Olivia! Over here.

  Did your father try to hurt you?

  Did you hear them fighting?

  Look at me, Olivia. Look at the camera.

  She froze like a fawn in the crosshairs, eyes dazed and wild. Then she was being scooped up from behind, her face pressed into the scent and shape of her aunt.

  “I want Mama, I want Mama.” She could only whisper it while Aunt Jamie held her tight.

  “She’s just a child.” Unable to stop herself, Jamie lifted her voice to a shout. “Damn you, God damn every one of you, she’s only a child.”

  She turned back toward the house and shook her head fiercely before her husband and her parents could step out. “No, stay inside. Don’t give them any more. Don’t give them another thing.”

  “I’ll take her upstairs.” Grandma’s eyes were dry now. Dry and cold and calm. “You’re right, Jamie. We deal with them now.” She pressed her lips to Olivia’s hair as she started upstairs. For her, Olivia was the now.

  This time Olivia slept, deep in the exhaustion of terror and misery, while her grandmother watched over her. That, Val decided, was her job now.

  In less soothing surroundings, Frank Brady thought of the child he’d seen that morning. He kept the image of her, those wide brown eyes holding trustingly to his, while he did his job.

  Sam Tanner was the now for Frank.

  Despite the hours in prison and the fact that his system was jumping for a hit, Sam’s looks had suffered little. It appeared as though he’d been prepped for the role of the afflicted lover, shocked and innocent and suffering, but still handsome enough to make the female portion of the audience long to save him.

  His hair was dark, thick and untidy. His eyes, a brilliant Viking blue, were shadowed. His love affair with cocaine had cost him some weight, but that only added a roma
ntic, hollowed-out look to his face.

  His lips tended to tremble. His hands were never still.

  They’d taken away his bloody clothes and given him a washed-out gray shirt and slacks that bagged on him. They’d kept his belt and his shoelaces. He was on suicide watch, but had only begun to notice the lack of privacy. The full scope of his situation was