Kitabı oku: «Dangerous Conditions», sayfa 3

Chapter Five

Paige got home to find her mother cooking dinner, which was unusual. Her mom had made it very clear when Paige moved back in with her that she was going to raise her own daughter and that meant housework, errands and making her child’s meals. Her only concession had been picking up Lori after school because Hornbeck Central School did not have an after-hours keeper program.

“Where’s Lori?” asked Paige.

Her mother continued stirring white sauce on the stovetop as she half turned to speak to Paige.

“She’s out back making a leaf pile and then jumping into it. Malory is watching her from the porch.”

Paige did not think that Malory, her mother’s long-haired cat, was an adequate babysitter, but a glance out the side window showed her daughter tunneling through dry leaves in the spotlight of the backyard floodlight.

Paige set her satchel on a chair at the breakfast table and removed her coat and scarf. Then she folded into the adjoining chair. Her mother brought her a bottle of scotch and a small juice glass and set it before her.

She gaped and then met her mother’s serious gaze.

“You heard?”

“Whole village heard. That ogre of a company let you go a few minutes early today?”

Paige lifted the glass. The strong, distinctive aroma reached her before she took a sip and grimaced. The liquid burned all the way down.

“I took some personal time.”

“You should take tomorrow. Those pills can wait a day.”

“I don’t make pills.” She set the scotch aside and wiped her watering eyes.

“I know what you do. I paid for some of that fancy education, remember?”

It was impossible to forget.

“Though I expect our constable will have the culprit arrested in no time. That is if he doesn’t mistake the church bell for the fire truck again.”

One of Logan’s early blunders was to head over to the fire station at noon his first day when he thought he heard the siren. It had turned out to be the bells that the Methodist church rang every weekday at noon and at ten a.m. on Sundays.

Paige ignored her mother’s jab at Logan. She was used to them.

“I’ve been over to see Ursula this afternoon,” said her mother.

“How is she?”

“She looks terrible. But her sister is there, and Freda told me that they are accepting callers tonight and tomorrow.”

“Tonight?”

She was surprised. They’d only just learned, and Paige thought they’d still be processing the shock.

“Freda said that Ursula does not want to be alone. The church is organizing casseroles to be delivered each day. Mine is tomorrow, chicken tetrazzini casserole. I think I won’t add the cayenne. I don’t know if the Sullivans like spicy food.”

Paige’s hopes of dinner vanished.

“I’m making enough for us, too. I should bring some to Albert, feeding that man-child.” Albert Lynch was the widower father of Connor and Logan. And the man-child, she assumed, was his brain-damaged son.

“Logan is not a man-child.” Paige’s voice was sharp. “He is just as smart as before.”

“Hmm. Then why does he talk so s-l-o-w?” she asked, drawing out the last word.

Paige knew exactly how smart she and Logan both were, with her breakup with Logan after she discovered he’d reenlisted and then sleeping with him again her senior year in college before he’d shipped out. Nobody in Hornbeck knew he’d been to see her at school. She’d been so angry at him and scared for him and it had just happened.

Nine months later Lori had happened. She’d picked the name to honor Logan. Hoped they’d have a chance at a second start after she finished her undergraduate schooling. His plan had not included being wounded and nearly dying. And hers didn’t include giving up on him. Their families had convinced her to stop telling Logan about Lori’s paternity when he couldn’t remember anything new past a few hours back then. She’d agreed, but she had continued to bring Lori for visits. Seeing their baby brightened Logan. Only she believed that Logan could handle the responsibility of caring for a daughter. As it turned out, she’d been wrong.

She’d ignored them and Lori now had a scar on her chin that served as a constant reminder that Paige was not always the best judge where Logan was concerned. Her emotions and hopes were too tied up in his being able to love her and their daughter to allow her to be unbiased. Now she feared trying and failing again with him. She’d given him time, years to recover. He didn’t forget things anymore. His speech had improved, and he was working now. It seemed dishonest not to again tell Logan about their relationship and his daughter. She’d have to tell them both eventually, especially when it seemed Logan no longer forgot things. She’d been waiting for Lori to be old enough to understand that her father had a TBI. Was an eight-year-old capable of comprehending this?

Maybe his father would agree with her that it was time.

“If you weren’t so stubborn, you’d…” Her mother’s words trailed off.

Paige tried to ignore the urge to ask her mother to finish her sentence, knowing that she wouldn’t like what she had to say, and failed.

“I’d what?”

“You would stop following Logan like a puppy and pay a little more attention to Logan’s older brother. Connor’s been sweet on you for ages and he’s asked you, I don’t know how many times, to go out with him. He’s got a thriving business and a political position. He has that big house that I’m sure he bought because he knows you love it.”

“That isn’t true.” But even as she said it, Paige suddenly feared it was true. “Logan is Lori’s father.”

Her mother sniffed. “Who can’t tell a baby from a remote control,” she muttered as she continued the rhythmic stirring.

Connor was the smart choice; any of the single, employed professional men at Rathburn-Bramley would be. She’d been asked. She’d said no.

Because she was an idiot. Because she didn’t love Connor. She loved the man who had left her behind. That man had not come back. As for Connor, fondness and guilt were poor foundations for a relationship.

Paige thumped her elbows on the table and cradled her forehead in her hands.

“Lori deserves a father, Paige. One qualified to care for her.”

She pressed her mouth closed to keep from lashing out. Her daughter did deserve a father and had one. It was Paige’s decision to keep them apart. And it was a decision she reconsidered daily as Logan improved.

“He’s not going to remember you, Paige. He’s just not and he never will. And even if he did, do you want to be married to a man who earns his living at the benevolence of others? He’s the village idiot.”

Paige pressed her hands flat on the table and rose to her feet.

“Mother, if you ever call him that again, I will take Lori and that job offer in South Carolina.”

“Might be better for you if you did. Better than seeing you mooning around after that boy.”

Paige gaped. She’d never expected her mother to call her bluff.

“Mom, is that what you want? For us to go?”

“I want what I’ve always wanted—what is best for you. And that boy never was and never will be.”

LOGAN FINISHED DIRECTING the rush of vehicles leaving the company lot and funneling up to Main to then head toward Mill Creek to the east or Ouleout to the west. After he stopped back in his office to lock up, he headed toward his blue 2004 Ford pickup. Then he made his way home. The temperature had dropped, and he worried that it might rain on Saturday. That would put a damper on the Harvest Festival. If this kept up, they could even have snow on their big day.

Instead of stopping at his home, he passed it and turned down Cemetery Road, crossing the West Branch of the Raquette River and then heading along River Street. Dr. Sullivan had lived in a Dutch Colonial home just outside the village. He had planned to only drive by but found cars and trucks parked in the drive and on the lawn. The porch was lit up and callers spilled across the porch and down the steps.

He parked across the road, off the shoulder, and headed over to the property. Logan tipped his hat and murmured hellos to the familiar faces and didn’t even try to focus on one speaker or another. With so many folks conversing at once, he just couldn’t identify who was talking. He passed Mr. Sinclair Park, who stood on the steps. He knew that Paige’s department reported to him, because she’d once pointed him out as her boss’s boss. He worked at the plant, something in production, and had moved to Hornbeck soon after being hired about the same time Logan started as a constable.

“Logan,” said Mr. Park. “Paying your respects?”

“Yes, sir.”

“That’s a good man.” Park slapped him on the upper arm as if he were a draft horse.

Logan stepped in from the cold and into the bright hallway. He removed his hat and gave it a spin before unzipping his constable jacket. He had intended to find Mrs. Sullivan, seeing her in deep conversation with her sister, Freda, in the living room, but then he spotted both Sullivan’s fourteen-year-old son, Steven, and eleven-year-old daughter, Valerie, sitting with their chins on their knees on the steps leading to the second floor. Instead of the familiar basketball shorts and sneakers, Steven wore gray slacks and a black shirt, and Valerie was wearing a forest-green skirt and white blouse. He’d never seen them in this sort of attire.

Steven’s chin lifted when he spotted Logan, assistant coach of his travel basketball team.

“Coach,” he said, his expression hopeful.

Logan changed direction and headed up the stairs, pausing to sit two steps below the kids. He placed his hat on the same step.

“I’m sorry about your dad, Steven, Valerie. He was a really good coach.”

Valerie didn’t make a sound, but tears sprang from her eyes and rolled down her cheeks.

“You going to be our coach now?” asked Steven.

“I don’t know. Probably.”

“Everyone keeps hugging me,” said Steven, his expression now cross. His lower lip and the break in his voice told Logan that Steven was on the verge of tears. A swipe of his sleeve across his eyes confirmed Logan’s guess.

“It’s okay to cry, Steven. When my mom died, I cried for months. Not all the time but a lot and sometimes when I didn’t expect it. I’d just start crying.”

“How’d she die?” asked Steven.

“It was an aneurysm in her aorta.” He pointed to his heart. “That’s like a bubble in the artery. The wall of that blood vessel is thick and tough, but my mom’s was thin there and when it let go she died very fast.” Right beside him at the grocery store just after he turned eleven. He remembered the way she’d fallen, as if she had been a marionette with all the strings cut at once. The grapefruit in her hand had rolled straight down the aisle in the produce section like a bowling ball. He’d hit his knees beside her and stared at her face. She’d looked so surprised. But she’d already been gone.

“Where is my dad now?” asked Valerie, shaking him from his dark memories. He wondered if the child meant metaphorically or physically. As he pondered how to answer, Steven cut in.

“Nobody will tell us,” said Steven. “They just say he’s in heaven. Or with God. But where is he really?”

“Do you mean his remains?”

They nodded in unison, eyes wide.

“They took your father’s body to Owen’s funeral home. They have beds there for folks who have passed. And since it was an accident, the state police need to have a look at him for clues to help them catch whoever did this.”

“And put him in jail,” said Valerie.

“Might be a him,” said Logan. “Might be a her. But we’re trying every way we know to catch them.”

“Is he cold?” asked Valerie.

“No. Definitely not.”

“I’ve only ever seen dead animals. They get all stiff and swollen,” said Steven.

“No, that won’t happen. The people at the funeral home will wash him and dress him and treat his body respectfully.”

“Why?” asked Steven. “He can’t feel anything now. Can he?”

“It’s more for the family. Rituals to take care of our dead. It’s a last act of love.”

“You ever seen a dead body?” asked the boy.

Logan had seen many, according to his military record, but he remembered only one. “My mother, when she died and then again the day of her funeral.”

“What about at war?” asked Valerie. “Dad said you were in combat and that some of the other soldiers with you died.”

He’d been awarded the Silver Star for valor after half the roof had caved in on him and his men in a building in Fallujah.

“I heard that, too. But I don’t remember any of those deaths because I got hit in the head,” he said as he pointed at the scar on his forehead as evidence.

Both the Sullivan children regarded the scar with serious concentration.

“Kids in my class say you got a metal plate in your skull and you can stick a magnet on your head and it just stays there.”

“No plate, so a magnet wouldn’t stick.”

“Steven, Valerie?” Mrs. Sullivan stood at the bottom of the stairs, holding the newel post and looking up at them with red-rimmed eyes. Their gazes met. “Mr. Lynch, I didn’t know you were here.”

He retrieved his hat and placed it over his heart as he stood. “I’m really sorry for your loss, Mrs. Sullivan. I had great respect for your husband.”

“Thank you, Logan.”

“He’ll be missed.” He descended the stairs, and she extended her hand. The circles under her eyes and the red, puffy eyelids made her look years older. He kissed her offered cheek and drew back.

“Thank you for coming. Have you had your supper? We have too much food.” She took hold of his hand and led him toward the dining room, but paused in the hallway to stare at him. “My husband was having some trouble at work this week. He told me that he was worried about something. Running helped him relax.” She spoke quickly as if she’d been bursting to share the information with the right person.

“What?”

“Anomalies. Missing samples. That’s what he said.”

Someone stepped up behind them.

Lou Reber, the plant’s head of security, moved from the living room into the hallway, and Mrs. Sullivan’s eyes widened. She spoke to Logan without looking at him.

“Go and fix a plate for yourself, Logan, and please take something back for your father.”

Reber came up to her and took her hand, expressing his condolences. Logan hesitated a moment and then stepped into the dining room where callers mingled around the overladen table in quiet conversation.

In the hallway, Reber moved toward the front door. Mrs. Sullivan glanced to Logan and then approached.

“Would you ask the sheriff to come see me tomorrow?”

“I can call him right now.”

Mrs. Sullivan glanced about the house, filled up with friends and members of the community.

“Tomorrow is soon enough.” She left him, returning to the living area through the arched opening connecting the two rooms.

Logan filled his plate and sat on a folding chair beside Donavan Bacon, a cook at the Lunch Box who had no shutoff switch when it came to alcohol. Bacon didn’t drink regularly but when he did, usually on Wednesday after his bowling league, Logan was often called to bring him home because drinking made him want to fight. Donavan greeted Logan warmly. He was such a nice man when he was sober.

After emptying his plate, Logan headed to the kitchen to deposit his glass in the sink. From the doorway he spotted Lou Reber in the hallway, heading up the stairs. He thought he’d left.

Likely to speak to the children who were sitting on the stairs, as he had done. But when Logan returned to the hall it was to see the children were not there and Lou was descending the empty staircase from the second floor.

Logan scowled, wondering why the man had gone upstairs when there was a powder room off the hallway.

“Hey, Logan. Rough day today, huh?”

“Sure was. Why were you upstairs?”

“Bathroom,” said Reber.

“There’s one down here.”

“Occupied.” He looped a thumb over his belt. “Did you know Sullivan?”

“Coached at the school with him.”

“Oh, that’s right,” said Reber. “I knew that. Dangerous to run on our roads. No shoulder.”

“He was on the cutoff. Wide dirt road. Shouldn’t be any vehicles back there.”

“Hunters use it.” He glanced toward the door. “I’ve got to go. You need a lift home?”

“Got my truck.”

“That’s right. You drive now. See you around, Logan.”

Logan watched him go, unsure what bothered him about Reber’s going upstairs.

He let himself out a few minutes later, but not before one of the ladies made him a plate for his father. In his truck, the aroma of food tempting his taste buds, Logan headed back up River Street to the steep incline on Cemetery Road. Ed would be buried there, probably next Saturday.

On Main he turned toward home, knowing that just beyond lay the funeral home and Ed Sullivan’s body. The autopsy was scheduled for the morning down in Albany, New York. The county had a contract with the medical center to perform such duties, and Dr. Brock Koutier, their coroner, had ordered it be done. As a result, the funeral would not be until next Saturday, giving the county enough time to transport Sullivan to and from Albany and then back up here to Owen’s for final preparation.

He slowed before the three large maple trees that stood as sentries between the road and Paige’s mother’s home. He pulled into the driveway between his dad’s and her mom’s properties, parked and then headed toward the kitchen door, but paused to breathe the cold air and glance toward his neighbor’s place.

The lights of the Morrises’ upstairs were all on and the porch light was off. Paige was home safe. He knew her bedroom sat on the west side of the house up front nearest the road, her daughter on the east and Mrs. Morris in the back near the stairs. There was a wide, flat roof that stretched over the ground-floor porch from the back of the house to the front, under Lori’s window. On the porch below, the rocking chairs creaked and rocked in the November wind. Paige’s bedroom had no roof beneath either of its two windows. He knew because there was a time when he’d thought about seeing if he could climb that big old maple tree out in front to her window and throw rocks at the glass. He’d decided against it. He wondered what would have happened if he had tried?

Movement caught his eye and he stepped off the road into the driveway. Something big moved down along the side of the house and into the shed that led to the backyard.

Was that Mrs. Morris? The figure had been too large to be Paige.

Propelled by an uncomfortable feeling, Logan walked to the shed, but found no one there or in the backyard. He knew their kitchen door was locked and the light off. The front door was also locked. He circled the entire house twice more and saw no one.