When the double doors finally stayed shut, Fiona took out her phone. She must have missed the text from Lee explaining what had happened. She hadn’t heard a beep, but sometimes she didn’t notice.
Nothing.
Quickly she texted him: Where r u? She knew he would not have been able to contact her from the plane, and when she’d heard nothing from Denver, she’d assumed he’d been rushed onto the connecting flight with no time in between. But if he had missed Flight 886, where was he?
Chapter Four
FIONA HEADED IMMEDIATELY for the Voyager counter. There was a lull in check-ins and she walked right up to the agent, a stocky blond with long comb-over strips of hair and the white company shirt of red feet. Looking past him she noticed the smaller logos of Day Star, Dakota, and WestAir on the back wall.
“Any luggage?” He bestowed a welcoming smile on her, enhanced by two front teeth outlined in gold.
She smiled back. “No. I’m here to meet someone who was supposed to be on Flight 886. But he wasn’t, and he hasn’t texted me or called.”
He tilted his head up like a squirrel sensing danger. “Where was he originating?”
“Taos. Someone from that shuttle did make the plane; he told me it got to Denver late.”
The agent considered. “Your passenger might not have gotten to the boarding gate fast enough. Or gone off in the wrong direction by mistake. Or stopped to pick up lunch. Was he waiting for a wheelchair? When they’re holding the plane to begin with, they don’t hang around.”
“Wonderful.” She reminded herself not to take her annoyance out on this man and added moderately, “What happens if he did miss it?”
“Nothing. He’ll get put on the next plane to Islip.”
“Really? Even if it was his fault?”
“We honor the Flat Tire Rule.” He winked at her, leaning his elbows on the counter. “One of the industry’s best-kept secrets. If you miss a flight, but show up at the counter within two hours, the government says we have to honor your ticket.”
“That’s still in effect?”
“Not all airlines honor it anymore,” he agreed. “We do, though. The next flight from Denver is due in forty minutes. He’ll probably be on that.”
“That’s not too bad.” They’d have to hurry to make their dinner reservation in Brooklyn, but it was still possible.
He looked pointedly past her and she moved away, realizing that other people were now waiting. Away from the queue, she stopped and took out her phone again. There had been no beep signaling a text. Was the server down? The server must be down.
BACK IN THE waiting area, she saw several people sitting in the circle of gray seats nearest the arrivals door. They were carefully ignoring each other, and especially avoiding a woman with a boy in a tray-table wheelchair and a beautiful little girl with red-gold curls. Around the trio was the evidence of their sojourn: plastic toys, used napkins, crushed paper cups, upside-down books. Waiting for Daddy? The woman, her pleasant face heavy with freckles, was paging through a Madeleine book.
As soon as Fiona stepped into the circle, several of the people looked up hopefully. “If you’re waiting for someone who was supposed to be on Flight 886, they’ll probably be on the next Voyager flight. It’s due in about thirty minutes,” she said.
A man about twenty-five with dark hair slicked back into a narrow ponytail stared up at her. One muscular arm hugged a red JanSport backpack, and the other hand was cradling a phone. “Thirty minutes? Are you kidding? How do you expect us to make the connection to Portland that’s leaving in ten? Answer me that!”
“Sounds hard,” she agreed. “You’re flying to Oregon from here?”
“Duh. Try Maine. You airline people don’t know shit.”
Airline people? “You think I work for Voyager?” She was astonished. “I don’t work for the airline.”
“Oh, right.” He closed his eyes and settled back in his seat as if he couldn’t be bothered talking to her anymore.
Who is this jerk? Fiona looked at the others and spread her arms. “You think black bicycle shorts and a chartreuse T-shirt are the airline’s uniform? I’m just here to meet someone.”
The freckled mother gave her a commiserating smile. “I’m glad you told us about the next flight. My father was supposed to be on the one that just came in, and when I didn’t see him I got worried. He gets so confused since my mother died.”
Fiona made a sympathetic sound.
“The last time he was here and read stories to my kids, he skipped whole pages.” She rolled large green-speckled eyes. “He didn’t even notice when it didn’t make sense. I’m Maggie, by the way. And Derek and Brenda.”
She looked desperate for human contact.
“I’m Fiona.” She finally let herself look at the boy. He had the same dark-red hair and attractive features as his mother, but his mouth stayed permanently open. He was slumping forward in the chair now, his leg twitching. Did he know he was at an airport?
“Does he have cerebral palsy?” In her travels, Fiona had found that most people liked to answer questions.
“No. Car accident. My husband was driving.” No smile now.
Life’s arbitrary spoilers, waiting in the shadows to strike out. Had the husband died?
“Mom-mee!” The little girl slid off her seat and faced them, stomping a tiny pink sneaker with a mermaid’s face on the toe. “I want to go home! You said we could go home. You know what? You lied!”
Maggie sighed and raised an eyebrow at Fiona. “Brenda’s my little devil.” Then she bent over to straighten Derek in the chair and wipe the drool from his face, and Fiona looked around at the others before sitting down. A stocky, dark-haired man in a red Planet Fitness T-shirt was paging through the National Enquirer, chuckling to himself. It was the first time Fiona had ever seen someone read the paper outside of a supermarket line.
She knew she should work on her column but felt too restless to concentrate. The other people felt intrusive, in her way, though they seemed absorbed in what they were doing. The woman across from her, whose wiry black-and-silver hair haloed her elegant face, was circling titles in the New York Times Book Review. She had on a silky white T-shirt and a skirt of giant red poppies, with red sandals on her narrow feet.
The woman looked up suddenly to glare at Brenda, who was rhythmically kicking her feet and hitting the underside of her seat. “Don’t do that, little girl! You’re giving me a headache.”
Brenda squinted at the woman and kept kicking.
“Brenda, stop, or no watching Frozen when we get home.” Maggie made a grab for her daughter’s feet, but Brenda squirmed away.
“You know what? You’re the meanest mommy I know!” But the kicking slowed, then finally stopped.
The woman gave her a syrupy smile. “Thank you, honey. It’s just that I’m on a tight schedule, and this delay is not helping.”
“Here.” The man with the National Enquirer held it out to her. “You’ll enjoy this.”
The woman stared at him, as if trying to decide whether she had been insulted. “Thank you, but I don’t read tabloids.” Her tone was dismissive, and Fiona was surprised to see the man’s mouth turn up in a secret grin.
It made Fiona laugh. “I read it when I’m in line at the check-out and there’s a headline I can’t resist,” she told him. “My favorite is ‘Titanic Survivor Found on Iceberg in Norway.’ ” When she read stories like that, she tried to figure out how they could somehow be true.
“It was here when I came,” the man added, distancing himself from the offending paper. He took out his phone and, after a moment, the woman picked up the Book Review again. She continued circling items.
Fiona checked for messages on her own phone, then glanced at her watch. Fifteen minutes to go. “Are you a librarian?” she asked the woman.
“A librarian? No.”
“An editor?” she persisted. Who else would be analyzing the Book Review?
“You can tell?” The woman seemed to r
elax and tossed her silver-black hair as if pleased. “They’d love to get rid of me, but I’m hanging in. It’s not the money, of course; my husband was a well-known dentist.”
“Lucky you.”
The backpacker snorted, but the woman’s dark eyes were amused. “What do you do besides ask questions?”
“I write. I had my own blog that was syndicated in a lot of newspapers—The Eccentric Traveler. Now I’m freelancing.” And trying to pick up the pieces of my professional life.
Fiona expected the usual polite smile, but the woman tilted her head, amazed. “Really? That’s you? I loved that column! Hang-gliding over Cairo. Getting Greek cab drivers to take you home to dinner. Getting lost wherever you went. Why ever did you stop?”
Because something so terrible happened that I had to come home. For a moment she felt overcome by that dark terror again. Stop! I’m sitting in an American airport. Lee is almost here, and we’ll have a wonderful evening. Tomorrow we’ll find our dream apartment, and I’ll be safe.
Realizing the woman was still waiting for an answer, she said, “You know how the economy is. Newspapers can’t afford outside writers anymore, and the Internet thinks everything should be free.”
“I’m waiting for one of my writers.” The woman was suddenly animated. “She’s just wonderful!”
Fiona tamped down a feeling of rivalry. “What does she write?”
“True crime. She’s reading at a mystery bookstore tonight and doing Good Morning America on Tuesday.”
“Wow.” Her competitiveness gave way to awe. “What’s her name?”
“Susan Allmayer. She was an investigative reporter in Phoenix, but moved to Santa Fe. I think Examination in Blood will be her breakout book.” She included the whole circle in her glance. “It’s a terrific story! All about a college professor who kills a pregnant student and mails her body parts to universities around the country. Unfortunately—for him—she was the college president’s daughter at the school where he mailed her head.”
The backpacker, who had been scowling at his phone, looked up at that. “Does that kind of writing pay?”
She studied him severely. “Yes, but it’s hard work. You have to do a lot of research and be able to understand the human heart. You need to interview people skillfully and write well. And you’ve got to have sympathetic victims, women or children, preferably from the middle class or above. Or at least with aspirations. People need to be able to identify with them.” Her hand crept into her white straw bag as if looking for something, then retreated. “Don’t tell me you’re a writer too. What are the odds?”
“Nah, computer science. But I’m looking to retire.”
The editor choked on a laugh. “Retire?”
“What’s so funny about that? I’m almost thirty. All it takes is one great idea, and you’re set for life.”
“That’s what your generation thinks, isn’t it?”
“Well, good luck to you,” the man with the Enquirer said. “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to retire.”
“What do you do?” Fiona asked.
“Pool maintenance. I have my own outfit. But my daughter’s only twelve. She’s who I’m waiting for.”
At that moment, the “Arrivals” notice flashed on the monitor, and there was a garbled loudspeaker announcement.
The editor stuffed her Book Review in her bag and pushed up from the navy worsted chair, giving an unselfconscious groan. “Lordy, these seats are excruciating!”
The rest of the group stood up too. Then, except for the backpacker, who was biting a knuckle, they smiled politely at each other.
Their voyage together was over.
Chapter Five
LEE WAS NOT on the plane. Fiona joined the group of people waiting and watched as the stream of exiting passengers once again slowed and then stopped. This time, she did not stop the flight attendants in their navy uniforms to question them. After several minutes, the lounge was empty again except for the people she had been waiting with. It was as if a giant wave had swept over a beach and left only them—flotsam—behind.
“Shit, shit, shit!” The backpacker pounded his fist against the back of a seat. “Where is he?”
“Where was he coming from?” But Fiona dreaded the answer.
“Taos. Where else?”
“Maybe this flight was already booked up,” the pool man said. “People who had tickets would be given preference over standbys.”
“Yes, but it wasn’t their fault!” Fiona told herself not to catastrophize. She had too much imagination.
“It is the end of vacation,” Maggie agreed quickly, giving Derek’s wheelchair a tiny jiggle to quiet his moaning. “I should have told my father to come next week.”
“He’d better be on the next flight,” the backpacker threatened.
Or else what?
“I get what you’re saying,” Fiona told the man. “But if they were bumped, why didn’t they call to let us know?”
Maggie laughed. “My dad wouldn’t.”
“Coral probably forgot to charge her phone again.” Her father gave a laugh. “I’m always on her about it.”
“Well, I think it’s very inconsiderate,” the editor said. “This is going to disrupt our whole schedule! Unless—did I give Susan my new cell number? I think I did.”
“I’m gonna find out what’s going on,” the backpacker announced, and stalked off.
Fiona pulled out her iPhone and retrieved a dial tone. The phone was still charged, still working. It was odd, though, that she hadn’t gotten texts from anyone else. It had to be a service glitch.
She started to put the phone away when it dinged. At last.
It was a text from her bank, offering a new deposit app.
The backpacker returned, a messenger with an outraged scowl. “That was the last fucking flight of the day from Denver! Can you believe it? From now on they fly into LaGuardia. It doesn’t matter; I’ve already missed the fucking connection to Portland!” He adjusted the red pack on his shoulders and stormed off.
“Well, I’m not driving all the way to Queens,” the editor said. “I’ll go home and wait for Susan to call me.”
“That’s all we can do,” the other man agreed.
No, it’s not! Fiona’s heart was racing like a frightened child in the dark. Before the second plane landed, she’d thought that Lee might have forgotten to charge his phone or left it on the Taos plane. There would been no time to retrieve it or to call her. But if he hadn’t made this flight either, he’d have found a phone.
She stood rooted to the floor by a more shocking idea. What if he had collapsed at the Denver airport and been taken to the closest hospital? No one would know to call her! If he were unconscious, he would not have been able to tell them. She pictured the paramedics trying to revive him, the wail of the ambulance siren peeling traffic out of the way, someone nestling his blue backpack beside his head.
What if he was dead?
Chapter Six
COMB-OVER HAD BEEN replaced at the Voyager counter by a woman with gray hair and a serious face. She looked up as Fiona stepped in front of her. “Name?”
“No, I’m not a passenger, I need to find out about my—fiancé. Did anything happen to one of the passengers on the morning shuttle from Taos or when it landed in Denver?”
“The Day Star plane? I haven’t heard of anything.”
“Can you check? Please? If anyone got sick?”
The representative pushed her lips into a single line as she considered it, then began typing on her keyboard. After a moment she picked up her dark blue phone. “Hi, this is Edie. Any emergencies on flights today? Specifically”—she peered at her computer screen—“Day Star 101 out of Taos?”
She listened, then said, “Uh-huh. Okay. Someone here is asking. Thanks.” A pause. “You too.”
She hung up and looked at Fiona. “Interesting you should ask. They had a fuel line problem and switched planes, but the flight got into Denver with no problem. It was lat
e, of course, but so was the feeder from San Diego, so they held our flight.”
“But no passengers got sick or went to the hospital?” A relief. Of course, a relief. But it didn’t answer her questions.
Edie looked at her, blue eyes kind behind glasses. “Why don’t you tell me what this is all about?”
This was what Fiona liked best about Long Island, that people cared enough to stop and talk to you. She glanced behind her, at the people and their luggage.
“Don’t worry about them. I’ll get someone.” Edie picked up the dark blue phone again. As soon as a young man in a white shirt with the Voyager logo stepped behind the counter, she motioned Fiona to one side. Fiona could feel the curious eyes of the passengers burning her back.
“My fiancé was supposed to be on that plane out of Taos, but he wasn’t. Several other passengers didn’t make it either, so we just thought they’d be on the next Voyager flight. But they weren’t, and somebody said it was the last flight from Denver for the day!”
Keep it together. Edie’s kindness and her own desperation made her voice ragged. “The other people had reasons their people might have missed the flight, but I don’t. I mean, he hasn’t texted me or called. He let me know he was getting on the plane in Taos. But then . . . nothing!”
“And that’s why you thought he might have gotten sick. What’s his name, hon?”
“Lee Pienaar.” Automatically she spelled it. You may have seen his photographs in magazines.
Edie moved away from her and picked up the phone. This time Fiona could not hear any conversation. Instead she watched the check-in progress beside her, saw the passengers produce driver’s licenses and in one case a maroon passport.
Then Edie was back, looking perplexed. “I don’t know what to tell you. A Lee Pienaar was scheduled for Flight 886, but he never checked in. He wasn’t on the next flight either. You’ll need to check with Day Star if he was actually on their shuttle. Unfortunately, they’re a Western outfit; they have no presence here. And we have no way to check their manifests.” She sighed. “I’m sorry.”
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