“The Internet has a lot to answer for,” I said. This was the last thing in the world I wanted to hear, though I wasn’t surprised. I tried to contain my anger, since Phillip was not the one who had been a rumormongering asshat.
“He didn’t know her, right?” Phillip sounded hopeful.
“Ahhhh … the answer to that is a little complicated.”
Phillip’s face fell. “I was afraid of that.”
“He didn’t know her as a friend or ‘girlfriend,’ but as his stalker,” I said. “And she tried to kill me last year.”
His eyes widened. “The woman who stabbed your maid? That was her?”
“One and the same.”
“And she’s the woman who came in the house? Looked at Sophie?”
I nodded.
“That is extremely scary,” Phillip said, and I could only nod again. “No wonder she got killed.”
“But we didn’t kill her.”
Phillip nodded. “What was her name?”
“Tracy Beal. But the police may not have gotten hold of her family yet. So don’t put her name on Facebook or any other social media.”
“I understand,” said Phillip. “And, you know, I’m sorry. About not telling you about the ambulance first. Josh told me that some guy fired a rifle into the house where the party was, Saturday night. He and Joss were there. It was pretty scary. That sidetracked me.”
“Why didn’t you and Sarah go?” I asked, because it was the first question that popped into my head.
“Her mom doesn’t like Justine’s parents. Dr. Halverson and his wife? They were giving the party. So, you know, that knocked the ambulance out of my head.”
He’d apologized several times now, and I had to accept it. “I know you’re sorry. I got in touch with my mother. A couple of minutes didn’t make a difference. And having someone fire a gun into a house is pretty scary. I’m glad you and Sarah weren’t there. Detective Trumble told me that had happened.”
Phillip, looking relieved, returned to his computer. I began the search for Robin’s keys, just to have something to do. He was a regular misplacer of keys. I’d put a special bowl on the island, designated the key bowl. We’d had to search much less often since we’d formed a habit of tossing our keys in that bowl every time we came in. Unfortunately, we’d also started dropping in other odds and ends, too.
I overturned the bowl and sorted through the contents, with no key results, though I did find my Starbucks gift card. Then I started checking other possible places. But my mind wasn’t on the search, and I came up with zero.
I zoomed into Sophie’s room at her first little sound and fed her in record time. As soon as I’d burped her, I called Robin. I loved to look at our child more than anything in the world, but today I could hardly wait to hand her off when Robin came in the door.
“How’s John?” I said.
“Hanging in there. Still alive.”
I was out the door in thirty seconds. I nodded to Lena, who was walking Chaka, and Jonathan, who was trimming the bushes by his front door … with a tape measure attached to his belt. I took off like a rocket.
For a couple of decades, Sparling County Hospital was little more than a way station where patients were stabilized and sent to bigger hospitals in Atlanta. In the last five years, it had been growing and competing. Some doctors simply didn’t want the pressure of maintaining practices and bringing up their families in the inner Atlanta metroplex, which was about to swallow Lawrenceton … every year it got closer. Since we had the doctors, a few energetic citizens had started a vigorous campaign to raise money for some of the diagnostic machines necessary to advance our facility to a higher level. My mother was one of them. I was proud she’d worked so hard to make this happen, and I hoped the effort was now going to pay off for her husband.
I hurried to the elevators. The ICU was on the third floor. Every moment inside in the hospital raised harrowing memories for me. The smell of the hospital, the glaring overhead lights, the nurses’ station, the anguished atmosphere … it all made me feel I was strangling. Though my heart was now with my new husband and our baby, I had loved Martin Bartell. His memory was bittersweet, but it was still part of me.
I forced myself to walk into the ICU waiting room. When Avery and John David saw me, they rose to their feet. They were both good-looking men. You could tell from Avery’s demeanor that he would never stray from a narrow path; that was not a bad thing, when you considered John David’s checkered past.
“How’s John?” I perched on the edge of one of the chairs, so they would sit, too.
“Still alive,” Avery said. “Melinda had to go home because the babysitter could only keep the kids until three.”
“We appreciated Robin coming.” John David was a better man since the death of his wife, Poppy. He was more serious, more determined to provide a stable life for his son. He’d been crying. His brother looked haggard. They had a close relationship with their father.
“I’m so sorry,” I said helplessly. There was nothing else to say.
John David nodded in acknowledgment.
“Your mom is alone with him now,” Avery said. “You can go in. It’s two at a time.” He looked away to hide his anguish.
My mother, disheveled for the first time in my memory, was sitting in a chair shoved in the corner. Her eyes were fixed on the man in the hospital bed. John was gray, his face empty and slack. He was hooked up to many devices that blinked and pulsed. His eyes were closed.
There was a straight-back chair pushed against the wall. I moved it closer to Mother. “Hi,” I said softly.
Without looking at me, she felt around until she found my hand, and she gripped it hard. She couldn’t speak. Tears began to run down her face.
I wanted to ask her what the prognosis was, what the doctors proposed to do to help John’s faltering heart, but in a rare moment of clarity I understood it was best to keep silent. We held hands, and we watched John’s chest move ever so slightly, and we watched the machines register the fact that he was still alive. Together, we went someplace where life was suspended, and all things waited in the balance. From far away, I heard the sounds of the hospital coming from the hall: a food cart rattling, nurses talking, families walking by, phones ringing at the desk. Somewhere not too distant, a janitor was buffing the floor.
But in this room there were only the small clicks and whirs of the machinery. Quiet people went in and out, checking on the machines, checking John. They might nod, but after a look at my mother they didn’t venture to speak. It was clear she did not want to hear pleasantries or conversation.
After an hour had passed, I slowly descended to my normal mortal plane. I began to feel the prickling in my boobs that meant I was ready to feed Sophie again. I glanced at the clock set high on the wall. I could stay another hour, in case she needed me.
My mother had all she could handle. There was no question of troubling her with the unpleasant occurrences at our house. I leaned over to pat her cheek. I was too anxious about germs to kiss her. “I’ll give one of the boys a turn,” I said quietly.
She nodded, without looking at me. Her hand loosened on mine. I left the room as soundlessly as I could and rejoined the world.
In the waiting room, John David was asleep in his chair. Avery rose to take a turn sitting with my mother.
“If something happens, please call me,” I said. “Mother may not be able to.” Avery nodded.
For another interminable hour, I sat—uselessly—with the sleeping John David and an elderly woman whose lips moved in silent prayer. I was tired and weak, absorbed in my worries and my fears. I didn’t even register leaving the hospital until I walked past the fountain in the middle of the circular drive and made my way across the jammed parking lot.
When I’d driven here, the dashboard display had told me the temperature was a balmy 75 degrees Fahrenheit, not unheard-of for late September in Georgia. Now the wind was making itself known, and the sky to the northeast looked dark and
ominous. The air felt noticeably cooler.
Another storm. Great.
This had been one of the longest and most unpleasant days I’d ever had. The only good thing had been Robin coming home early.
If things had been normal, I’d have planned a special dinner to celebrate his Anthony and my whole family (now including all the Queenslands) would be sitting down at the table.
I was hit with a wave of self-pity.
After I climbed into my car and turned the key in the ignition, I simply sat there with my hands over my face. I had to move forward. I had to drive home and take care of my daughter. I could not retreat to a dark closet and wail.
I made myself think of good things. Or at least, relatively good things. Robin had identified the dead woman, so her family could be notified. (If there had to be a dead woman in our backyard, it was good to know her name.) No matter what our neighbor Jonathan Cohen thought he had seen, Robin had a good alibi, unless the detectives decided Jeff was not a reliable witness. I couldn’t imagine any reason why that would happen. To the lay mind, it might seem fishy that Robin had forgone an evening of triumph to plan a new series in a hotel room with his buddy. But at least he hadn’t been in his own room, asleep.
As I drove home through the dark streets, the great thing, the best of all, hit me in the face.
Sophie was safe. Despite the strange and dark happenings in our house, under our roof, in our yard, our daughter remained healthy and untouched.
I could only feel deeply grateful. From that relief, I found the courage to pray for John: that his doctors were skilled and discerning, that he would regain health and strength, that my mother would be able to endure this ordeal. It was amazing how much more I felt the power of prayer since I’d had Sophie. Maybe I was whistling in the dark, superstitiously drumming up something to make me feel that I was helping to keep her safe.
But I didn’t think so.
Chapter Twelve
I called the hospital first thing in the morning, and the nurses told me John had made it through the night. I texted Melinda to get some details. I really wanted to talk to Mother, but she was out of reach in the ICU. I had to try to schedule some hospital time. I wondered if I could persuade Mother to go home to rest.
When I got out of the shower, Robin was sitting in one of the living room armchairs. Sophie was lying on his lap, her feet to his stomach. He was talking to her in a manic, high voice. “Oh, who is the cutest baby? Sophie is! Yes, she is! Look at her little feet!” He tickled her little feet gently. “Look at her little tummy!” He blew on her stomach. “Her starfish hands!” He clasped her tiny hands. They both seemed to be very happy.
Robin had moved my purse in his renewed search for his keys. I shoved it back into its accustomed place in the corner of the kitchen counter. Robin told Sophie, “Mama’s out of the shower! The milk wagon is here! But let’s see if we can play a little longer.” He put his fingers in the baby’s grasp and then moved them gently back and forth. Sophie gave one of her fleeting smiles.
“Look at her,” Robin said. “She’s just been playing and playing. Hasn’t fussed at all. Even Moosie came over to say hello.”
“How did that go?”
“Moosie couldn’t have been more nonchalant. She strolled over, sniffed her, sat and looked at Sophie for a few minutes to see if she’d do anything interesting. When Sophie didn’t, Moosie went out the cat flap.”
“That cat’s pretty smart about staying in our yard,” I said. “I know this is a minor problem—in the big picture of our issues—but I’m a little worried about her. I suspect she’s deaf.”
Robin was surprised. “Maybe Dr. Lowell knows how to find out,” he said hesitantly. “I don’t know what a feline deafness exam might be. Why’d you think of that?”
“I don’t think Moosie can hear Chaka or Lulu barking at her.” I was reinterpreting several past instances when I thought our cat was being either very provocative or recklessly bold.
“Speaking of Chaka,” Robin said, to my astonishment. “I wonder what rescue organization the sisters used. I had been wondering…”
I looked at him blankly. Obviously, he was expecting me to pick up on his idea, but honestly, I had nothing.
“If we might get a dog?” he said hopefully.
That was so far from my list of conversational topics that I just goggled at him. “A dog?”
“We always had at least one, when I was growing up.” I’d never applied Robin’s mom’s love of her two little pets to the likelihood that Robin’s family had always had dogs. “Do you hate the idea?” Robin was truly anxious.
“No,” I said, though I wasn’t sure that was true. I was scrambling to assemble a response. “I like dogs just fine. I’ve never had one myself, but I’m sure I can find books on how to take care of one. I have no problem with Lulu or Chaka, except Lulu gets kind of yappy. But Peggy says that’s because the Cohens haven’t trained her. She says if you spend time with your dog, they can turn out fun to have around. I’ve noticed obedience classes on the community board at the library. Robin, how long has this been on your mind?”
“Well, since before Sophie. But we had so much on our plate that it didn’t seem like the right time to bring it up.”
“We’re still pretty occupied with our new household member,” I said, nodding toward our daughter. Her arm waving was done, and her eyes were fluttering shut and then snapping open. She didn’t want to miss the party. (I was a little concerned that she was falling asleep without feeding, but I was willing to give it a try.)
Robin was still waiting hopefully.
“Okay, I am not against us getting a dog. But let’s let Sophie grow a little bit first, since she’s taking up so much of our time and energy.”
A quiet knock at the door ended the dog discussion, to my relief. Since Robin had Sophie, I answered the door.
Detective Levon Suit grinned at me. “Roe, how you doing?”
“Hi,” I said, off balance. I was no longer glad to see Levon. It was unpleasant to realize that our relationship had changed overnight, since he’d become a detective. But I forged ahead. “It’s a little early in the morning for a visit. Can I get you something to drink? Coffee?”
“No, but thank you,” Levon said, ambling by me. I looked over his shoulder to see that the sky was overcast and the air felt damp. Just great.
Robin said hello, and gestured to Sophie on his lap to explain why he wasn’t standing to shake hands. Levon was tactful enough to take the opportunity to praise Sophie, and I felt somewhat warmer toward him.
“Katrina’s due to pop at any moment,” Levon said. “And we’ll have us another one of these.” Levon and Katrina had been married since high school graduation.
“That’s so great! Have you picked out a name?”
“Katrina’s old-fashioned about that. She thinks it’s bad luck, like buying baby clothes before the birth.”
I had never heard that one, and I’d thought every tired old superstition and bit of folklore had been trotted out and presented to me as gospel while I was pregnant with Sophie.
I was thinking about our bed. Though I’d slept all night, I was still tired. That weakness told me just how sick I had been. I needed to feed Sophie soon. I should call Aubrey to tell him about John, though I was almost certain he knew already. A cadre of parishioners kept Father Aubrey Scott abreast of all the happenings in his flock.
“What can we do for you, Levon?” Robin asked, thank God. He could tell I was zoned out.
“I came to tell you a few things.”
Not to ask them. Great! “We’re all ears,” I said, and I noticed that Robin and I were actually both leaning forward slightly.
“The preliminary word is that what killed Tracy Beal was a blow to the head,” Levon said. “But she didn’t land on a rock when she fell. There was nothing like that in the area of her head. So the blow wasn’t accidental, we figure. As you probably saw at the crime scene, she had been holding a knife. At least, it wa
s by her right hand. But there was no blood on the blade. She hadn’t used it.”
That was a lot of information to absorb at one time.
“Okay,” Robin said. “Thanks for telling us. Can you say if she was hit while she was standing up, or while she was on the ground?”
Good question. I leaned against Robin’s shoulder, which felt very comfortable just now.
“The medical examiner says she wasn’t standing upright,” Levon said. “But she wasn’t lying flat on the ground, either. It’s a strange depression, Dr. English says. Whatever caused the dent in her skull, it hit her really hard, one big blow. And that’s what—that’s all—we know about her death until the ME does a thorough autopsy. Her clothes didn’t turn up anything interesting.”
“How come she turned up here at all? With no warning?” What little energy I retained was channeled into this grievance. Why hadn’t we been alerted when Tracy had escaped?
“We were waiting on a doctor’s decision about whether or not Tracy was mentally competent to stand trial. She was in the jail wing of a private psychiatric facility until four days ago. Then she escaped.”
“No one told us,” I said, my anger (and my voice) rising as I spoke. Sophie’s eyes flew open, and Robin glanced at me meaningfully. He stood to carry Sophie to her room, jiggling her gently, and humming.
In a quieter voice I said, “Levon, she tried to kill me the last time she was out. Don’t you think we should have known the minute she went missing?”
Robin returned to sit by me. We were waiting for Levon to answer, and we had the same accusing look on our faces.
“I don’t blame you for feeling that way, but it was a series of delays that added up to failure. The hospital didn’t realize Tracy was gone for at least five hours. Then they searched the grounds in case she had committed suicide, probably another forty-five-minute delay, and a clear violation of the protocol. Then they notified the local police. It’s a small force. They were dealing with a three-car wreck in the middle of downtown at rush hour. Another delay. The staff didn’t finish dealing with all the traffic consequences, site cleanup, and paperwork until late the next day. Then they found they were supposed to notify our police department, so we could contact you. They did call our department. A clerk took down the message and stuck it at the bottom of the paperwork pile on Cathy’s desk. She had a backlog because—well, I think she told you we’ve been busy lately. She didn’t work her way down to that message until after Tracy turned up dead. I’m sorry. I understand if you’re upset.”