“You had nothing to do with it. Trust me, Chenney, I know.”
Chenney didn't sound mollified. Maybe he liked Riggs after all, maybe they had formed some version of a partnership. Stranger things had happened.
“Well, we got some answers and some questions. Which do you want first?”
“Go in order. Where are we with the Sheffield homicide?”
“Well, I'd think you'd know more than me—”
“Chenney.”
“Yeah, fine. Okay. Jax is heading up the case, and let me tell you, he's riding Harper with a vengeance. Jax ordered fingerprinting powder over every damn square inch of the study, and every time Harper makes a condescending remark, Jax simply has more floorboards ripped up and sent to the lab. Yesterday he even tore down the curtains. Soon Harper's gonna be living in a crime lab.”
“And this is teaching us . . .”
“How to have a good time. No, we don't have many leads other than Melanie Stokes. Lairmore has us attacking it from the healthcare side. I was over at the hospital yesterday conducting the interviews on Sheffield. Interestingly enough, another anesthesiologist, Dr. Whaler Jones seems to know an awful lot about Sheffield. I get the impression she was a little jealous of all the surgeries Sheffield got to pick up. She can put Sheffield at the hospital at all sorts of times he had no good reason to be there, that's for sure.”
“Still circumstantial.”
“Yeah, that's the problem we have. Too many circumstances. Lairmore is toying around with having all pacemaker patients receive a second evaluation, but from what we've heard, that won't fly. The attorney general tells us we could be sued by Harper for ruining his reputation. To be on the safe side, we got all the serial numbers of the pacemakers Harper has installed in the past five years. Quite a list, let me tell you. The FDA ran a cross-check. They've received only one complaint on the batch, which is actually well under the industry average. So we can't even go after the pacemakers that way. Everything appears perfectly legit.
“At this point, we'd have to bring in patients, remove the pacemakers, and then hook the patients to a heart monitor to see if they're truly bradycardic. Let's just say both the legal and medical experts agree that's not a great idea. On the other hand, the pacemakers naturally expire in five years and will have to be removed, so if we're willing to be patient . . .” Chenney shrugged, declaring bluntly, “We got nothing, Riggs. At this point Harper's coming away clean.”
“What about the outline of the papers next to William's body?”
“That's the thing. There's gotta be documentation somewhere. We've ripped apart Sheffield's apartment, but no such luck. Bank shows Sheffield deposited some rather large checks from Harper, but Harper claims the money was a gift to his one-time future son-in-law, and who are we to argue? We couldn't find any propranolol in William's place, no notes, and no friends who have an inkling what he was into.”
“Jamie O'Donnell might know something.”
“Well, that brings us to the second point. Jamie O'Donnell seems to have skipped town. Checked out of the Four Seasons yesterday afternoon and nothing's been heard from him since.”
“Hmmm.” David tucked that information away. Of all the people to come after Melanie, Jamie O'Donnell would be it.
“Patricia Stokes has also bolted,” Chenney said.
“Huh?”
“Yep. I was over at the Stokes house earlier this afternoon. Harper's playing cool about it, but the maid told us Patricia packed a bag last night and walked out the front door. Boston homicide talked to the people at the Four Seasons, but they claim they haven't seen her around. Most likely she finally got sick of Harper's shit. I mean, trying to turn in your own daughter . . .”
“Not endearing,” David agreed.
“Oh, I almost forgot. Harper has on a bandage today. His whole hand is wrapped up. Seems he injured it somehow, but he won't talk about it. Jax even asked him point-blank what he'd done and Harper told him point-blank to go fuck himself. You know, I don't think Harper has that fresh feeling anymore.”
“Think if Jax pushes him hard enough, he might crack?”
“I don't think it's Jax,” Chenney said. “I think our mystery manipulator is pulling out the stops. It's what she wants, right? All those little gifts reopening old wounds. Melanie's on the run, Brian's removed from the family, Patricia finally left her husband, and O'Donnell has gotten the hell out of Dodge. Harper's alone and feeling the strain. Ten to one, the man is frightened. I don't put anything past him at this point. I'm trying to run down information on Ann Margaret, by the way. Nothing immediate comes up on the computer though, and I haven't had time to do anything more in-depth. Kind of need more hands at this point.”
“Don't we all. What about the Texas angle? I'm here, so let's use me.”
“Actually, you may be helpful, Riggs. I think I may have a break in Texas.”
“That's my boy.”
“Okay, Jax and I went through the public pay phone records yesterday. Nada. I mean zip. But Jax—give him some credit here, Riggs—didn't subpoena just the Boston records, he got Larry Digger's Houston phone records as well.”
“Son of a bitch. He never told me that.”
“Of course not, we're the feds, remember?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“Well, you were the one who said Digger reported the anonymous call three weeks ago. Sure enough. Twenty-five days ago, Digger's phone records suddenly exploded with calls. I got them from Jax. Then to entertain myself this morning, I cross-referenced the names of the people Digger called with the mid-wives association's list of Texan members. And guess what I found . . .”
Chenney rattled off the name, David quickly wrote it down. “I'll look her up first thing in the morning. If she remembers Russell Lee Holmes, she must remember his wife, so maybe I can tie in Ann Margaret from this side.”
“Yeah,” Chenney said, but he sounded troubled now. “Riggs . . . I got more news.”
“That's what they pay you for.”
“I . . . uh . . . I kinda started exhumation proceedings for Russell Lee Holmes.”
“Jesus, Chenney.”
“My off-the-wall theories aren't so off the wall anymore, Riggs. I even got Lairmore scared. Remember the shrine in Melanie's room? The blue scrap of fabric with the two types of blood?”
“Of course. Come on, Chenney, spit it out.”
“Okay. They've positively ID'd one blood sample as belonging to Melanie Stokes. It's an absolute match. A lot of blood work was done when she was first found twenty years ago, so they had plenty to go on. Which brings us to the second blood sample . . . They did a DNA test, Riggs. There is a fifty percent match between the second DNA and Melanie's DNA, what you'd see between parent and child.”
“Oh, shit.” David closed his eyes. He already knew what Chenney was going to say next.
“I think we finally found the missing player in our game, Riggs. We've just sent away for Russell Lee Holmes's medical files and blood samples to confirm, but we can already tell you that the second bloodstain is an XY chromosome. We're talking Melanie Stokes's genetic dad. And, Riggs, the lab swears that bloodstain is less than one week old.”
THIRTY-TWO
H ARPER STOKES STOOD alone in the middle of his study. He had turned on the lights earlier, but the illumination had only frustrated him, revealing the glowing powder, the torn curtains, the ripped-up floorboards. For the past twenty-four hours Boston homicide had swarmed his home, investigating every carefully decorated nook, manhandling every lovingly acquired antique.
It seemed there was no place he could go anymore without being watched by a uniformed officer. No refuge left in the respectable life he'd spent his whole life building.
Jamie was gone. Patricia was gone. He wondered if she was finally happy with Jamie O'Donnell, and that thought left him gutted.
No Brian. He'd called his son's practice. They said Brian had been out for days. He didn't believe it. He'd swallowed his pride, begged for his own son's emergency
number, knowing it would probably belong to some man. It had.
Nate had been polite. Brian was gone. He didn't know where. He did consider him missing.
Harper had hung up the phone feeling suddenly old and, for the first time, lonely.
Empty house. Crime-scene tape. A bandage on his hand. Once again smug Jamie O'Donnell was right. It had all come full circle.
He couldn't just stay here and mourn forever. He was a man of action. It was time to get something done. For his family. For himself.
He went up to the bedroom. From a locked safe in the walk-in closet he pulled out a gun. The bandage on his right hand made it too hard to grip, so he unwound the gauze. The fresh tattoo blazed up at him: 666.
He muttered, “But I am not the devil. I didn't harm Meagan, dammit, and I'm not even close to Russell Lee Holmes.”
At least, not yet.
THIRTY-SIX HOURS AFTER abandoning her husband, the euphoria had left Patricia Stokes.
She'd tried to use her credit card; it had been canceled. She had tried to use her ATM card; it had been declined. She was fifty-eight years old, carrying a suitcase of designer clothes, and she was penniless. A wave of fear had hit her, and she simply wanted to run to the safest place she knew—the arms of her husband.
She'd spent the previous night with friends. It had gotten her through the first few hours. With daybreak, however, had come the realization that she needed a purpose. For once in her life she needed to take control.
She'd tried the Four Seasons. Jamie O'Donnell was gone. She'd tried her son's apartment. She found her son's lover packing up her son's things and telling her that Brian had left town. He had no idea where her son had gone.
Patricia knew only one other person to try.
Now she stood with her suitcase in front of the home of Ann Margaret Dawson. She knew Ann Margaret only as her daughter's boss. Now Patricia swallowed her pride and knocked.
After a moment the door cracked open. Ann Margaret peered out cautiously, as if she were expecting something unpleasant. Then her eyes widened in surprise.
“Patricia,” she said, and opened the door all the way.
“I left Harper,” Patricia blurted out.
“Are you looking for Jamie?”
“No,” Patricia said in bewilderment. “I'm looking for you!”
Ann Margaret closed her eyes. There was something sad about her expression. “Do you love him?”
“Who?”
“Jamie.”
“Of course not. That was years ago. I just want my daughter back!”
Ann Margaret said quietly, almost gently, “Patricia, I believe it's time we talked.”
BRIAN STOKES HUNKERED down lower in his seat at the airport waiting lounge. The first flight to Houston wasn't until morning, so he might as well catch some sleep. He was anxious though, already worried that he was too late.
He'd done wrong by Meagan. There was no escaping the hard, cold facts, he thought. His troubled mother had had an affair with his godfather. She'd given birth to Jamie's child and Harper had found out. Harper had engineered the death of Meagan, probably out of rage but also out of greed. His dad had killed his sister for a million bucks.
And Brian had never said a word.
Well, he'd been a child back then. Now he was an adult, and he vowed to do more for Melanie.
He fidgeted in his seat, trying to stretch out his spine, then stiffened.
He could have sworn he caught a glimpse of someone familiar, but when he looked again, no one was there.
MELANIE WAS NOT sleeping well. She was in the cabin. In the cabin in the middle of the woods, watching the spider ease across the window. And Meagan was behind her. Meagan was rocking back and forth, clutching her pony.
“Please let me go, let me go, let me go.”
You have no idea what he can do.
Then a shadow fell across the wood floor. A man filled the doorway and he took a step into the room. Cold wind swept through the cabin. Meagan shrank back and Melanie already knew that all was lost. He was back and it would only get worse.
“No,” Meagan whimpered.
“No!” Melanie cried out.
“It's okay,” David Riggs murmured in her ear, and cradled her close. “I've got you now, Melanie. I've got you.”
She whispered, “Too late.”
THIRTY-THREE
W HEN MELANIE WOKE up next, she was alone in the bed. The room was shadowed, the thick curtains tightly drawn against a blazing Texas sun. In the background came the rhythmic hum of cars racing over a concrete interstate. Closer was the rattle of a metal cart wheeling across the balcony as a cleaning woman performed her rounds.
Melanie blinked a few times. Her head was fuzzy, the impression of lingering dreams still hovering around her like a shadow she couldn't dispel. A dull throbbing had burrowed in behind her left eye. Not a full-blown migraine yet, but she should probably take some aspirin.
She finally turned her head and searched for signs of David.
Clothes were strewn across the floor. She spotted his slacks and his suit jacket, carelessly tossed by the chair.
Then Melanie heard a new sound, low, half muffled. A moan of pain.
Melanie rushed to the bathroom. She wasn't prepared for what she found.
David Riggs was writhing on his stomach on the cold tile floor.
“Oh, my God, it's your back.”
She went down on her hands and knees beside him, but David didn't reply. His face was bone white and contorted into a horrible expression as he beat the floor with the heel of his hand.
“Do you need ice? What about medication? Surely you're on something for this.”
For answer, his legs kicked out and another guttural moan escaped his lips. She leaned closer, and when she looked into his eyes she saw something worse than pain—she saw impotent rage.
“Go . . . away,” he gasped.
Melanie compromised. She threw on clothes and went running for ice. When she returned, he was still on his stomach, but he was crawling now. In many ways it was an even more horrible sight.
So this was arthritis. This was strong, capable David Riggs's world.
Melanie discovered tears on her cheeks. She put the ice in his dress shirt with shaking fingers and fashioned a clumsy ice pack.
“I'm going to put this on your back,” she told David.
David muttered something that might or might not have been a curse. Melanie plopped the makeshift ice pack on his naked lower back. Immediately his body arched, the muscles in his neck cording, and his lips curled back to bare his teeth.
“I'm sorry,” Melanie whispered. “I don't know what else . . .”
“Leave . . . it,” David snarled. “Time.” His head sagged between his shoulder blades, his body still convulsing.
Melanie sat beside him and waited. Eventually his limbs stopped twitching. His face relaxed more, still red and flushed. He finally got to curl his legs up, assuming the fetal position.
“How is it?” she ventured.
“Fucking . . . awful.”
“Does this happen a lot?”
“Has . . . phases.”
“Surely there's something you're supposed to do. Exercises, medication . . .”
David didn't say anything, but his gaze darted toward his travel bag. Puzzled, Melanie got up and opened it. Inside she found a bottle of orange pills. Naproxen, she read. The date on the bottle was almost a year ago, but it looked completely full.
“David, I don't understand.”
“It's arthritis,” he muttered, looking cornered. “My spine is fusing. Sometimes I wake up at night with the muscles locked around my ribs so tightly, I can't breathe. On my really good days, maybe I can skip to work. But then I get days like this to bring me back to earth. What's a fucking pill gonna do about all that!”
Melanie touched his cheek. “You're afraid, aren't you? You're afraid that if you take this first pill that you'll finally be giving in. You'll finally be admitting that y
ou have a chronic disease and you will have it for the rest of your life.”
“No, goddammit! I'm afraid I'll take that damn pill and it won't get any better. That nothing will change and what will I look forward to then, Melanie? What will I have to hope for then?”
“Oh, David,” she whispered. “Oh, sweetheart, you have arthritis, not cancer.”
The haunted look on his lined face undid her. He broke and she took him into her arms, cradling his head on her lap, rocking him against her.
“They put her through chemo so many times,” he muttered hoarsely. “So many times and they never did any good, and we cleaned and it never did any good. Nothing ever did any good.”
“I understand, I understand.”
“I wanted to make my father so proud. I wanted to make him so damn proud.”
“He is, David, he is.”
“Goddammit, Melanie, I loved baseball. And there's nothing I can do. I'll never be everything I wanted to be. Never.”
“Oh, David,” she said quietly, “none of us ever are.”
Eventually the worst passed. She remained curled up on the floor with him, still stroking his hair, neck, shoulders. And then she became aware of the smooth feeling of his skin, the distinct delineation of lean muscle and sinew right beneath her touch. His head came up. She saw his fierce blue eyes, and then she was on her back and they made love again, fiercely and with unexplained need.
Afterward they lay without speaking, intertwining their fingers over and over again, and listening to each other's heartbeats. It told them enough.
“I have a name and an address for the midwife,” David said finally, hours later.
“All right,” Melanie said.
They both got up and dressed.
THE ADDRESS LED them to a nice neighborhood, much nicer than what Melanie expected of a woman who had once assisted Russell Lee Holmes. The modest ranch house was nestled in one of the new suburbs bursting up all around Houston, where every fourth house looked exactly the same, just painted slightly different. The yards were lush, well manicured. A few young saplings thrust toward the sun, their meager year's worth of growth marking the age of the houses around them.