Dix felt Savich and Sherlock behind him, Savich solid as a wall, and Sherlock, her hand resting lightly on his shoulder throughout the entire graveside service. His anger toward Savich was long gone, but he remembered how he’d wanted to smash Savich in the face when he’d refused point-blank to let him see Christie’s remains. Why? he’d asked. You already have the image of her you want to keep in your mind and your heart for the rest of your life, Dix. Let it rest, let her rest now. It’s over, finally over.
And Sherlock had stood with Savich, united against him. Ruth hadn’t said a word, he remembered, simply listened to him rave and yell. He knew she would never say anything about that remote site in southern Tennessee where the dogs had found—no, it was over, Christie’s life was more than three years over.
He straightened when Reverend Lindsay called for the final prayer, a prayer of acceptance, of granting oneself a measure of peace and the chance of becoming. What did becoming mean for him? But of course he knew. It meant bringing Ruth in fully, it meant bringing his boys forward now that they’d said a final good-bye to their mother, and it meant becoming what they were meant to be. He wondered what that would be for each of them. But whatever happened, the four of them would be together now.
It was over. Reverend Lindsay finished speaking. Dix felt hands touching him, heard quiet voices speaking to him and his boys, accepted the endless stream of words he couldn’t take in now, but they would be there in his memory, and perhaps he’d recall them one day.
Chappy, tears running down his face, didn’t want to let him go. He held the older man, Christie’s father, so many times a pain in his butt, but still Christie’s father, who’d loved her more than anything, and his grandsons, her sons, at his right elbow. Behind him stood Christie’s godfather, Jules Advere, who’d collapsed when he’d seen Charlotte Pallack in San Francisco. The phone call from Chappy seemed a lifetime ago, but it wasn’t.
The gentle monotone of voices went on and on until he thought he might start to weep, and not stop.
At the end of it all, Reverend Lindsay came over to shake Dix’s hand. The reverend had a strong hand, dry and firm. “Dix—”
Reverend Lindsay said nothing more until Dix raised his face and looked at him directly. He said very quietly, his voice as firm and steady as his hand still holding Dix’s, “Christie’s home now. And she knows you and the boys will always hold her in your hearts, in rich memories that will never leave you.” Like Savich’s words, Dix thought. Reverend Lindsay laid his hands on both boys’ shoulders. “Rob, Rafe, I want you to remember your mother as a woman of joy, laughter, and endless goodness. She loved you both with all that was in her.” He drew both boys against him. “She had such great pride in both of you, enjoyed both of you so very much.”
When he turned to Chappy, he enfolded him in his arms as he had the boys, and held him, not saying a word. The sun went behind the clouds again, and the rain began to fall more heavily.
Ruth raised her face to the rain and felt how warm it was, and how it seemed to soothe away some of the deadening pain. Dix looked at her over his boys’ heads.
She smiled, and nodded, and took his hand. The four of them made their way through the lingering crowds of townspeople, some who’d known Christie only by sight, some dear friends, their eyes still red with tears, and they walked slowly through them, trying to make eye contact with them, shake hands, so many hands, all of them wanting to say the right thing. Rob sobbed and Ruth leaned down and kissed his cheek, nothing more. He plowed ahead, doing what his father was doing, speaking and nodding, grateful there were so many people who’d wanted to say good-bye to his mother.
Savich and Sherlock stood beside Tony and Cynthia Holcombe. Tony’s cheeks were stained with his tears, but he smiled as he shook Savich’s hand.
“Thank you for helping Dix. Thank you for bringing my sister home.”
“Dix managed that all by himself,” Sherlock said. “He wouldn’t let it go. It was Dix who brought it to an end.”
Hours later, when everyone had left Dix’s house, and it was quiet, and the four of them were finally alone with themselves and with each other, Dix suddenly stilled. He could swear he felt Christie close, felt her warmth, the memory of the light sweep of her fingers against his cheek. He felt her there, in front of him, smiling and nodding, and then, slowly, she backed away, farther and farther, until there was only the still warm air, and his family.
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Savich walked out of Reagan Airport into bright late-morning sunlight that nearly blinded him. He slipped on his sunglasses, hefted his carry-on clothes bag and MAX, and looked toward the line of taxis.
He couldn’t remember feeling this ground under or burned out, like he wanted to chuck it all and catch the next plane to— somewhere, didn’t matter. He was filled with frustration, his own and the cops’ in the Cleveland PD, and anger at failure. He’d helped them locate their suspect, but the guy had gotten through their net despite everyone’s best efforts.
He sighed as he walked across the median. Nobody’s fault, just a really lucky murderer now in the wind, out of their reach, at least for a while. Joseph Pinkerton Painter had killed four people and could now be in Rio, basking in the sun. Savich thought he wouldn’t mind being with him he was so tired.
He wasn’t more than a forty-five-minute taxi ride from Georgetown and home. Maybe he could nap a bit on the way so when he stepped through his front door, he could catch both Sherlock and Sean up against him, laugh and kiss them, and mean it.
He stepped forward to claim the next taxi when a loud horn brought his head around.
It was Sherlock in her steel-gray Volvo, waving wildly at him. Seeing her happy, welcoming smile, her wild red hair curling around her face, lifted at least ten pounds of weight off his shoulders. She screeched up beside him, much to the fury of two taxi drivers, both of whom yelled at her, one in Russian, one in Arabic, but doubtless yelling the same things.
He threw his clothes bag in the backseat, carefully laid MAX on top, and climbed into the passenger seat.
Amid all the shouting, the gimlet eye of an airport security guard coming toward them, he kissed her. She stroked his face, smoothed his hair behind his ear, and let her hand slip beneath his belt buckle, all while whispering into his mouth how much she’d missed him.
“We’d best get ourselves out of here before the guard hauls our butts to the slammer. As for your hand, sweetheart, I’m so tired, I’m numb from the neck down.”
Sherlock laughed as she refastened her seat belt. “We’ll see about that, but later. You don’t want to drive my baby?”
“Pul-ease” was all he said.
“I can’t believe how you despise my wheels, good solid wheels—”
He rolled his eyes.
She laughed. “All right. You look ready for an eight-hour nap—so why don’t you lower your flag to half-mast and close down until we get home?”
Savich was asleep before Sherlock turned out of the airport exit.
He felt something on his cheek, heard soft breathing, no wait, there was a slight hitch, then—it was kisses all over his face, warm, wet, smelling of honey. Honey? He opened his eyes, stared into his wife’s brilliant summer-blue eyes.
He cupped her face in his hand. “We’re home? Already?”
“Well, not exactly.” She kissed him again, this time a kiss with her tongue that brought him awake like nothing else could have.
He paused a moment. “Not exactly what? We’re not home yet?”
She shook her head, patted his cheek, and slithered away from him to open the driver’s-side door. “Come on, Dillon, time to get yourself together and face the world.”
He didn’t want to face the world. Not for a long time. It was Saturday morning. He didn’t have to face any world at all until Monday. He wanted to sleep, to make love to Sherlock, play basketball with his boy. He yawned, finally taking in his surroundings.
“What? This isn’t Georgetown?”
&nb
sp; “It sure enough isn’t, you’re right about that. Come on, Dillon, we’ve got some things to do.”
He got out of the Volvo, started to get his gear out of the backseat, but she grabbed his arm. “No, you don’t need your stuff, just come with me. I’ve got a surprise for you.”
A surprise? He stood up and looked around him. He was in the driveway of a big shingled house with a huge yard, trees creeping in on both sides, and it was familiar—
“Why are we at the Maitlands’ house?”
“You’ll see. Come on.”
She took his hand and more or less pulled him up the flagstone walk, both sides bursting with more flowers than Savich had ever seen. They were Mrs. Maitland’s pride and joy.
"But—”
Suddenly the front door burst open and Sherlock tugged him inside. At least a zillion people mobbed him, yelling “Surprise,” all laughing and talking at once, telling him he looked like warmed-over toast. Everyone was on him, shaking his hands, both of them, slapping him on the back, the women kissing his cheeks, and finally there was Mr. Maitland, built like a bull, his small wife grinning up at him from beside her husband, flanked by the four Maitland boys, bruisers all of them. He hugged Mrs. Maitland, high-fived the rest of them.
“Papa!”
Sean ran full tilt at him and Savich scooped him up and held him high over his head, Sean yelling, “You’re not going to believe what Mama—”
“Sean, no!”
“Okay.” And Sean started telling him about his new goldfish and how his terrier Astro kept trying to put his head in the fish tank.
Finally Savich managed to get a word in. “Sherlock, are you going to tell me what all this is about? What’s—”
Mr. Maitland grabbed his arm. “Come this way, my friend. I’m going to give you a huge glass of iced tea and a disgusting cold pepper and olive sandwich Sherlock told my wife is your very favorite lunch.”
“Well, I—”
He was pushed and prodded toward the back of the house to a long line of French doors that gave onto the back patio and a long expanse of lawn and oak trees.
The doors opened, and Ollie Hamish said in his ear, “Take a step outside, just one step, yes, that’s right. Sean, my man, come to your uncle Ollie.”
Once his son was safe in Ollie’s arms and swung up onto his shoulders, Savich went down the three steps leading to the patio.
“Dillon, look to your right!”
That came from Ruth, and he grinned toward her, saw Dix and the boys, and slowly, not knowing what was going on, he turned and saw a truly beautiful thing—a brand-new shiny red Porsche 911 Carrera Cabriolet, sitting splendidly alone in the driveway, a huge red ribbon wrapped around it, a large red bow on the steering wheel.
“Happy birthday, Dillon!”
“It isn’t my birthday,” he said, not taking his eyes off the incredible machine.
“No matter, it is now,” Mr. Maitland said, his hand on Savich’s shoulder. “Sherlock decided you’d been stoic long enough driving that Fort Knox Volvo of hers. She’s tired of all that crying in the dark hours of the night over your burned-out Porsche. Ain’t it a beauty, Savich?”
But Savich wasn’t capable of talking. He stood staring, taking in the incredible fire-engine red convertible with its black leather interior. He heard Agent Ford MacDougal shout out, “I hear it goes from zero to sixty in under five seconds.”
“Four point eight seconds actually,” Savich said, not looking up as he ran his hand lightly over the top of the driver’s-side door and then around to the back. Classic, clean lines. He rubbed his hand down the smooth sweep of the trunk.
He heard laughter, mostly from the women, and one of them said, “So this is what guys need for transcendence?” Then he heard Mrs. Maitland say, “Four point eight seconds? What in heaven’s name is that sort of blastoff good for? Are you going to race to the grocery store?”
Mr. Maitland said, “It’s the fact you can do it that counts.”
“Dillon?”
He turned slowly to his wife, who said, “As you can see, Mr. Savich, it sits on eighteen-inch alloy wheels. Not to mention the interior glows like a spaceship with everything lighted up—the dashboard, the communication system, the navigation system. It even displays entertainment info. Oh my, this baby’s goodies just don’t end—it’s got a fabric top, carbon-fiber interior trim, and a Bose surround-sound stereo.”
“I know,” he said, grabbed her up, hugged her hard, and kissed her.
“Papa, can I drive it?”
Not for another twenty years or so, but he said, “Sure. Your legs have to grow a bit more so you can reach the brakes, though.”
“I can sit on your lap!”
Like that’ll ever happen, Savich thought, reached out and ruffled his son’s black hair. Sean looked as excited as his father, his eyes back on the Porsche.
“Here are your keys. No, Sean, you can ride with your father next time. This first time, well, he has some bonding to do, it’s a man and his machine sort of thing.”
Savich took the keys from Sherlock’s outstretched hand, and without another word, grabbed the end of the huge red bow— exactly the same blast-off red as the Porsche—and pulled it loose. He threw it back over his shoulder, like a bride with her garter, and everyone laughed. It was Dane Carver who shouted, “I got it! What do you think, Nick? How about a new Porsche in hissyfit yellow?”
Savich opened the door and eased down into the driver’s seat. He closed his eyes and inhaled the rich-as-sin leather smell, let the seat enfold him. He put the key in the ignition, and felt the Porsche all but hum around him as the powerful engine roared to life. Ah, sweet music for the universe.
He threw back his head, marveling at the perfection of the world and his place in it, eased the gear shift into first, and pressed lightly on the accelerator. Well, lightly at first.
Everyone heard him laughing as the Porsche roared out of the Maitland driveway and attacked the road.
Catherine Coulter, Double Take
(Series: FBI Thriller # 11)
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