Kisscut

  “She in there?” Mark asked.

  “No,” Sara said, looking over his shoulder. “She’s behind you.”

  Lacey’s hand went to her mouth as if to stop herself from screaming.

  “Right,” Mark said, giving Sara a scathing look.

  “I want you out of here right now, Mark. You’re trespassing,”

  He ignored her, walking into the office. Sara followed him at a distance, trying to be casual about the fact that she was trapping him in the room. She prayed that Marla had gotten hold of someone, even if it was Brad Stephens.

  “Lacey?” Mark said, his voice softer, but in a more menacing way than before. He walked around the desk. “It’s only gonna be worse if you don’t come out now.”

  Sara crossed her arms. “What’s purity, Mark?”

  Mark looked under the desk, cursing when he found it empty. He kicked it, moving the steel desk across the floor a couple of inches.

  “Did you make Jenny feel dirty? Is that why she wanted to make herself pure?”

  “Get out of my way,” he ordered, walking toward Sara.

  She put her hand on the door, blocking his exit.

  “Get out of the way.”

  “What’s purity?”

  He looked like he might answer, but Sara realized too late he was just trying to throw her off guard. The next thing she knew, she was being pushed back, and hard. She fell into the hall, whacking her head on the floor.

  “Sara!” Molly said, running around to help her.

  “I’m okay,” Sara managed, trying to sit up. She looked down the hallway and saw that Lacey was still there about the same time that Mark did.

  “Run!” Sara told her. Lacey hesitated, but finally seemed to understand she needed to get out of here. She ran to the door and slammed it open.

  “Bitch,” Mark yelled, taking after her.

  Without thinking, Sara reached out and grabbed at Mark’s foot. He tried to yank it away, but she caught the leg of his pants in her fist.

  “Stop it,” Sara said, trying to hold on.

  He reached down, hitting at her hand with his fist. When this did not work, he punched at her face. Sara saw the glint of the red stone in his ring before the first blow caught her on the forehead, and she was so surprised that she let go.

  “Oh, my God,” Molly breathed, putting her hand to her mouth.

  “Crap,” Sara hissed, touching her forehead. Mark’s ring had caught her right at the temple. She looked at the blood on her fingers, but then thought of Lacey and made herself stand.

  Molly began, “Maybe you should—”

  Sara took off after Mark and Lacey, shouting, “Where the hell is Jeffrey?” over her shoulder.

  Sara stopped outside the back door, trying to get her bearings. The sun was beating down, and Sara shielded her eyes as she tried to spot Lacey in the trees behind the building.

  “Did they go around front?” Molly asked, jogging toward the side of the clinic. Sara followed her, bumping into the nurse as she turned the corner.

  Molly was pointing to the road. “There she is.”

  They both took off at the same time, but Sara’s stride was longer, and she soon left Molly behind. The road in front of the clinic was hardly a busy thoroughfare, but at lunchtime the professors and students left campus to come into town. Sara watched as Lacey ran into the street, Mark right behind her, screaming at the top of his lungs.

  Somehow, they both made it across the road. Lacey ran toward the lake, but Sara watched as another figure, a blur, really, came from the side and tackled Mark to the ground. By the time Sara and Molly crossed the street, Lena Adams was straddling Mark’s back like a rodeo rider as she jerked his arms behind him and cuffed his wrists.

  “Oh, shit,” Lena said, looking up the street.

  Lacey was too far away for Sara to recognize her by any other means than the bright yellow raincoat. Sara stood helpless, watching as an old black car stopped beside the girl. The passenger-side door swung open and an arm reached out, grabbing Lacey around the waist and pulling her inside the car.

  SARA touched the bandage on her forehead as she got out of the car. Molly had sewn in two sutures, then canceled the rest of Sara’s appointments so that she could have some downtime in order to recover from the ordeal at the clinic. Sara’s head hurt, and she was hot and irritable. She might as well have stayed at the clinic and seen patients, but Molly had not really given her a choice. Maybe the nurse was right. Every time Sara thought about what had happened at the clinic, she felt as if a band were being tightened around her chest. Knowing another one of her kids was in jeopardy and that there was absolutely nothing she could do made Sara want to put her head on her mother’s shoulder and cry.

  “Mama?” Sara called, kicking off her shoes as she closed the front door behind her. There was no answer, and Sara walked back to the kitchen, asking, “Mama?” again.

  There was still no answer, and Sara felt her heart sink. She filled a glass with water and finished it all in several gulps, then wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

  Sara flopped onto the kitchen stool and picked up the phone, dialing Jeffrey’s number. Lena had taken Mark off to the station before Sara had thought to ask her where he was.

  “Tolliver,” he answered, and she could tell from the hollow echo of his voice that he was in his car.

  “Where are you?” she asked.

  “I got caught up in Alabama for a while,” he told her. “I talked to Lena. She told me about Lacey. You didn’t get a look at who was in the car?”

  “No,” Sara answered. “Did you talk to her parents?”

  “Frank’s with them now. They don’t know anybody who drives a car like that.”

  “What has Mark said?”

  “He won’t talk to anybody,” Jeffrey told her. “Not even Lena.”

  “Who would want to kidnap her?”

  “I don’t know,” Jeffrey said. “We’ve put out an A.P.B. all over the state. I want to talk to Mark and see if we can find anything out.”

  “I feel like we’re missing something big here,” she said. “Something right under our noses.”

  “Yeah.” He was quiet, and she could hear the engine rev in his car as he accelerated. He said, “Tell me what happened today. Beginning to end.”

  Sara took a deep breath, then told him. The part Jeffrey seemed to focus on most was Mark hitting her, probably because it was the only thing he knew he could take care of.

  “What did he hit you with?” he asked, his tone sharp.

  “His ring,” she said, then amended, “His fist, really, but his ring did most of the damage. He wasn’t really hitting hard. He just wanted me to turn him loose.” She put her fingers to the bandage. “It’s not bad.”

  “Lena wrote him up on assault?”

  “Probably,” Sara answered, letting him know he should drop it.

  He got the hint. “Did it look like Lacey knew the people in the car?”

  “It was so far away, Jeffrey. I don’t know. I wouldn’t have even known it was her except for the bright-yellow coat she was wearing.”

  “Lena knew the car. Some of the kids from school had seen Jenny Weaver get into it.”

  Sara played with the cord of the phone as he told her what Lena had learned at the high school. When he was finished, all she could say was, “That doesn’t sound like the Jenny I knew.”

  “I’m beginning to think nobody really knew her.”

  She said what had been nagging in the back of her mind all along. “Do you think Mark and Lacey are the parents?” she asked. “I mean, I know that’s why you wanted the sample on Mark, but it never occurred to me that…”

  “I know,” he said. She could tell from the quick way he answered her that Jeffrey had been thinking about this for a while. “I think it’s possible.”

  She asked, “What was your reading on Teddy Patterson?”

  “Possible there, too.”

  “I doubt he’ll submit to a test without an
order.”

  “You got that right.”

  Sara sighed, wondering how all of this fit together. “Maybe Jenny found out and was jealous?”

  “Could be,” he said, and she could tell he was concentrating on something else.

  “Jeff…,” Sara began, not knowing how to broach the subject without making him angry. “Mark was cut across his abdomen. It wasn’t bad, but I think someone probably tried to hurt him.”

  “Good.”

  “No,” she stopped him. “He’s a kid. Promise me you won’t forget that.”

  “A kid who may have raped his sister and pimped out her friend,” he said. “A kid who punched you in the face.”

  “Forget about me,” Sara told him. “I mean it, Jeffrey. Don’t make it about me.”

  He said something under his breath.

  “Jeff?”

  He asked, “You didn’t get any more information out of her?”

  “She seemed disoriented, and terrified.”

  “Do you think she’s seriously ill?”

  “I don’t know if it’s fear or shock or if she’s recovering from giving birth. I didn’t get to spend much time with her. I…”

  “What?”

  “I feel responsible for not looking out for her. She was in my clinic. If I’d been able to keep her there—”

  “She ran away, Sara. You did what you could do.”

  She pressed her lips together. “I wish that made me feel better.”

  “I wish it did, too,” he said. “I wish I could tell you how to get rid of the guilt, because I sure as hell don’t know.”

  Sara felt tears well into her eyes. She put her hand to her mouth so that Jeffrey could not hear her cry.

  “Sara?”

  She cleared her throat, wiping under her eyes with her free hand. She sniffed, because her nose was running. “Yes?”

  Jeffrey said, “Was there anything else Lacey said? Maybe something about Mark, why he was after her?”

  Sara bristled, because asking her the same questions over again wouldn’t get them any closer to finding Lacey Patterson. “Stop questioning me. I’ve had a bad enough day without getting the third degree from you.”

  He was silent, and she could hear the engine accelerate again.

  Sara closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the wall, waiting for him to speak.

  “I just…” He stopped, then, “I gotta tell you, the idea of somebody hurting you really pisses me off.”

  She laughed. “Me, too.”

  “Are you all right?” he asked again.

  “Yeah,” she said, though she was feeling very unsettled. The clinic had always been a safe place for Sara, and she did not like the fact that her work at the morgue had somehow seeped into her private practice. She felt vulnerable, and she did not like that.

  “Nick called,” she told Jeffrey, then explained to him what Nick had said.

  “Purity?” Jeffrey repeated. “That’s what Jenny said.”

  “Right,” Sara agreed. “I think it all goes back to sex. She wanted to be clean again, right?”

  “Right.”

  “So what made her feel unclean?”

  “Banging all those guys at the party might have done it.”

  “She was drunk,” Sara reminded him, feeling anger stirring deep inside of her.

  “They say she wasn’t too drunk to know what she was doing.”

  “Of course they said that. What else would they say, that they raped her?”

  He cleared his throat. “That’s a point.”

  “Why else would she do what she did?” Sara demanded. “Jenny wasn’t like that. She was just a little girl, for Christ’s sake.”

  Jeffrey’s tone was indulgent. “We don’t know exactly what happened, Sara. We probably never will.”

  Sara changed the subject, knowing she could not have a logical conversation with him about this right now. “Nick sent that tattoo to the FBI. Nothing kicked out on their database.”

  “That’s actually what held me up,” Jeffrey told her. “I’ll tell you about it tonight.”

  “No,” she said. “Tell me about it tomorrow.”

  He was silent, then, “I thought you wanted to see me tonight?”

  “Yes,” Sara assured him. “I do, but not to talk business.” She waited a few beats. “I need to not think about this tonight. Okay?”

  “Okay,” he agreed. “As long as I still get to see you.”

  “If you can stand it,” she said, trying to make light of it. “I’ve got a big green Band-Aid on my head.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  “Mmm,” she mumbled, looking out the window. She saw her mother walking up the steps to Tessa’s garage apartment.

  “Sara?”

  Sara turned back to the conversation. “I’m counting on you to help me take my mind off of it.”

  He laughed at this, and seemed pleased. “I’ve got to talk to Mark and do a quick briefing with evening patrol about looking for Lacey. Not that there’s much any of us can do tonight. I’ll be there as soon as I can, okay?”

  “You think it’ll be late?”

  “Probably,” he said. “You want me to let you sleep?”

  “No,” she told him. “Wake me.”

  She could almost hear him smiling. “I’ll see you then.”

  “Okay,” she answered, then hung up the phone.

  Sara got another glass of water before going outside. The pavement was hot as white coals against her bare feet, and she tiptoed the last couple of yards to get to the stairs.

  Tessa’s apartment was large, with two bedrooms and two baths. She had painted the walls in primary colors and accented these with comfortable chairs and a roomy couch that tended to make the occupant want to take a long nap. Sara had often slept over at Tessa’s, especially after the divorce, because she felt safer at the time being here than being in her own home.

  “Tessie?” Sara called, trying not to let the screen door slam behind her. Cathy had left the wooden door wide open, which seemed odd since the air was on.

  Tessa’s voice seemed strained. “Just a minute.”

  Sara walked back to her sister’s bedroom, wondering what was going on. “Tess?” she said, stopping in the doorway.

  Tessa was holding a tissue to her nose, and she did not look up when Sara came into the room. Cathy was beside her, arms crossed over her chest.

  “What happened?” Sara asked at the same time Cathy did.

  “What?” they both said.

  Sara pointed to her sister. “What’s wrong with you? Why are you crying?”

  Cathy walked over to Sara and put her hand to Sara’s head. “Did you hurt yourself?”

  “It’s a long story,” Sara said, waving away her mother’s hand. “Tessie, what’s wrong?”

  Tessa shook her head no, and Sara found herself suddenly feeling dizzy. She sat on the bed, asking, “Is it Daddy?”

  Cathy frowned. “Don’t be silly. He’s healthy as a horse.”

  Sara put her hand to her chest and let out a puff of air. “Then, what’s the matter?”

  Tessa walked over to her dresser and picked up a long piece of white plastic. Sara recognized the pregnancy test stick before her sister handed it to her.

  Sara could not think what to say, so she said, “You’re supposed to do these early in the morning.”

  “I did,” Tessa answered. “Then I did it again at lunch, and then again just now.”

  “All positive,” Cathy said. Then, “I guess we can take her into the city next weekend.”

  “Into the city?” Sara asked, wondering why they would need to go to Atlanta. She figured it out soon enough, and shook her head no, not accepting this. “You’re going to get an abortion?”

  Tessa took back the test stick. “I don’t really have a choice.”

  “That’s not true,” Sara snapped, standing. “Of course you have a choice.”

  “Sara,” Cathy chided.

  “Mother,” Sara began, t
hen, “Jesus Christ, Tess, you’re thirty-three years old, you make a great living, you’ve got Devon so in love with you he can’t see straight.”

  “What does that have to do with anything?” Tessa asked.

  “It has everything to do with it,” Sara told her.

  “I’m not ready.”

  Sara felt so shocked that for a moment she could not speak. Finally, she asked, “Do you know what they do, Tessa? Do you know what the procedure entails? Do you know how they—?”

  Tessa stopped her. “I know what an abortion is.”

  “How could you even think—?”

  “Think what?” Tessa snapped. “Think that I’m not ready to have a baby? I can think that pretty easily, Sara. I’m not ready.”

  “Nobody’s ever ready,” Sara countered, trying not to yell. “How can you be so selfish?”

  “Selfish?” Tessa asked, incredulous.

  “All you’re thinking about is yourself.”

  “I am not,” Tessa shot back.

  Sara put her hand over her eyes, not believing she was having this conversation. She dropped her hand, asking, “Do you know what they’ll do? Do you know what will happen to the baby?”

  Tessa turned away. “It’s not even a baby yet.”

  Sara grabbed her sister’s arm and turned her back around. “Look at me.”

  “Why? So you can try to talk me out of this?” Tessa asked. “This is my choice, Sara.”

  “What about Devon?” Sara asked. “What does he have to say?”

  Tessa pursed her lips. “It’s not his decision.”

  Sara knew what Tessa meant, but asked anyway, “What, you’re not sure he’s the father?”

  “Sara,” Cathy warned.

  Sara kept her back to her mother. “Is he?”

  “Of course he is,” Tessa said, indignant.

  Sara stared at her sister, trying to find something to say that would stop this. When she opened her mouth to speak, what came out surprised them all. She said, “I’ll raise it.”

  Tessa shook her head no. “I couldn’t do that.”

  “Why?”

  “Sara,” Tessa said, as if she was being obtuse on purpose. “I couldn’t let you raise my child.”